What are the main factors determining the costs?

There are four factors determining the direct costs of producing articles from reinforced polymer composites. These are:

• Material costs
• Tooling costs
• Processing costs
• Finishing costs
  

Additionally, there may be a number of indirect costs, such as quality control, health and safety considerations, etc. which need to be taken into account but are not dealt with here. Also, there is an increasing emphasis on environmental factors including maintenance , recycling, and disposal, which, over the lifetime of a component, can be important. For many components, the benefits from the use of reinforced polymer composites can become very significant when whole-life costs, rather than just fabrication costs, are included.