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Production & capacity

Production Capacity Calculator

Find out whether you can actually make the order before you accept it — and which stage is the real limit.

Your numbers

Use your own costs — the defaults are only a starting point.

Time available
Time per unit
The target

You are 88 units short of the target. Your hands is the binding constraint — adding capacity anywhere else will not help.

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Units you can make: 512
9 input fields available.

How this calculator works

Accepting a wholesale order or committing to a market season is a capacity decision before it is a pricing one. The question is not whether the price is good; it is whether the units can exist by the date.

Capacity is almost always bound by one stage. This works out both your hands-on limit and your machine limit, and tells you which one is actually binding — because adding capacity anywhere else changes nothing.

The formula

  1. Effective hours = weeks × production hours a week × efficiency factor
  2. Hands-on capacity = effective hours × 60 ÷ hands-on minutes per unit
  3. Machine capacity = machine hours available × 60 ÷ (machine minutes ÷ units per batch)
  4. Capacity = the smaller of the two — that stage is the binding constraint

What to watch for

  • Capacity is set by whichever stage is smaller, and only that stage. Buying a second machine when your hands are the constraint changes nothing except your bank balance.
  • The efficiency factor is not pessimism. Setup, tool changes, interruptions, a bad batch and the day the extraction fails are all real, and 100% is not a number any workshop hits.
  • Machine hours can exceed your own, because a machine runs while you do something else. That is exactly why the two constraints are calculated separately.
  • Committing more than about 90% of capacity leaves no room for repeat customers, remakes or illness. Treat the last tenth as insurance rather than inventory.

Common mistakes

  • Counting all working hours as production hours.
  • Assuming 100% efficiency, which overstates capacity by a quarter or more.
  • Adding machine capacity when labour is the constraint.
  • Accepting a wholesale order on price without checking the units can physically exist by the date.

Frequently asked questions

How many units can I realistically make?

Multiply your weeks by your weekly production hours, apply an efficiency factor of around 80%, then divide by the hands-on minutes each unit takes. Compare that against your machine capacity separately — the smaller number is your real limit, and it is often a lot lower than the arithmetic people do in their heads.

What efficiency factor should I use?

Seventy-five to eighty-five percent for most small workshops. It covers setup, tool changes, interruptions, remakes and the days when nothing cooperates. If you have never measured it, start at 80% and adjust once you have tracked a few real production runs against the plan.

Should I accept a wholesale order I can barely fulfil?

Usually not at full capacity. If the order uses more than about 90% of your available hours, you have no room for the repeat customers you already have, for remakes, or for being ill. Either negotiate a longer lead time or take a smaller opening order — both are far better than delivering late.

How do I increase capacity?

Only by relieving the binding constraint. If your hands are the limit, that means reducing hands-on time per unit, batching similar work, or bringing in help. If the machine is the limit, it means longer machine hours, fuller batches, or another machine. The calculator names which one applies.