Multiple Machine Tool Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic Salary

The median multiple machine tool setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic salary in the United States is $47,180 per year ($22.68/hour). Salaries range from $35,780 at the entry level to $74,450+ for the top 10% of earners. There are 124,590 multiple machine tool setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastic jobs nationwide. Employment is projected to decline 0.5% through 2034.

Last updated: June 2026 Β· Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

Median Salary
$47,180
per year
Hourly Rate
$22.68
per hour
Employment
124,590
jobs in the U.S.

Salary Distribution

10th percentile
$35,780
25th percentile
$39,420
Median
$47,180
75th percentile
$57,800
90th percentile
$74,450

Job Growth (2024-2034)

-0.5%
Decline

Annual Openings

12,800
jobs/year (growth + replacements)

Education Required

High school diploma or equivalent

Training Needed

Moderate-term on-the-job training

Multiple Machine Tool Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic Career Guide

Interview questions, resume templates, and a career ladder written specifically for multiple machine tool setters, operators, and tenders, metal and plastics.

Multiple-machine operators run two-to-six CNC or manual machines simultaneously in a manufacturing cell β€” feeding, unloading, gauging, and correcting offsets across the group without letting any machine idle. Employers include aerospace machine shops (Boeing, Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin, Spirit AeroSystems), medical device manufacturers (Stryker, Zimmer Biomet, Medtronic), automotive Tier 1 suppliers (Magna, Denso, ZF Friedrichshafen), and thousands of independent job shops. BLS median $47,180 with p10 $35,780 and p90 $74,450 across 124,590 jobs. Entry $36-42k on 2nd/3rd shift as a tender; established $46-55k running a cell with SPC responsibility; senior $60-74k+ at aerospace or medical shops with programming duties, 5-axis fluency, or lead-operator roles.

Core Skills Hiring Managers Screen For

Machine startup, warm-up, and shutdown procedures
Coolant check, way-oil, chuck jaw torque, tool-magazine inventory, part-zero verification. A cold-start error compounds β€” one wrong offset feeds through 40 parts before first-piece inspection catches it.
Cell orchestration β€” running 2-6 machines simultaneously
Sequence load/unload so no machine sits idle. Typical cell β€” one lathe (Mori Seiki NLX, Okuma LU, Doosan Puma) plus two mills (Haas VF, DMG Mori DMU, Makino) plus a bar feeder. Miss a cycle-end and you lose $80-200 in machine hour and material.
Blueprint & GD&T reading (ASME Y14.5)
Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing β€” profile, position, runout, flatness, perpendicularity, cylindricity. Aerospace and medical prints run tight β€” profile of a surface at .0005" or position at true position .0002" is normal. Misreading a datum callout scraps the batch.
Precision measurement & first-piece inspection
Mitutoyo digital calipers (Β±.0005"), Starrett or Mitutoyo micrometers (Β±.0001"), Zeiss / Mitutoyo CMM (Β±.00005"), height gauges, gauge pins, thread ring/plug gauges. Aerospace requires CoC (Certificate of Conformance) traceability on every gauge.
Tool offsets, wear compensation & SPC
Tool wear reduces part diameter β€” operators log per-cycle measurement in SPC (Statistical Process Control) charts and enter offset compensation on the Fanuc / Mitsubishi / Siemens control before the tolerance drifts. Reactive operators fail; proactive ones stay in Cpk 1.33+ territory.
Fanuc / Mitsubishi / Siemens / Heidenhain control fluency
Edit tool offsets, adjust work coordinate systems (G54-G59), modify feed override, run in single-block for diagnostics, understand M-codes for coolant, chip conveyor, tool change. Not full programming β€” but confident enough to correct a program mid-run without calling the programmer.
Preventive maintenance & basic troubleshooting
Way oil top-off, coolant concentration (refractometer 6-10%), spindle warm-up cycle, chip conveyor clearance, air-blast nozzle alignment. Small maintenance skips (bad coolant concentration) generate scrap that a machinist has to explain to a shift lead.

How to Become a Multiple Machine Tool Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic

  1. 1
    Complete high school or GED plus one of: (a) machinist certificate at a community college, (b) apprenticeship, or (c) military machinist training
    Community college machinist certificates run $3-8k for 12-18 months (Wichita State, Sinclair, Chattanooga State, Pierpont, El Camino College are strong programs). NIMS-accredited apprenticeships are 4 years and paid. Military β€” Navy Machinery Repairman (MR), Army 91E Allied Trade Specialist β€” translate directly.
  2. 2
    Start as a tender / operator on 2nd or 3rd shift at a Tier 1 automotive or independent job shop
    $16-19/hr + shift differential. Load/unload parts, deburr, monitor coolant, log SPC. This is the training-ground rung. Most shops move you from tender to full operator in 6-12 months if you're accurate on measurement.
  3. 3
    Cross-train to run multiple machines in a cell simultaneously
    $19-24/hr with cell-operator premium. Learn to sequence load/unload without letting a machine idle, edit tool offsets, correct wear compensation. Cell operators are worth 2x a single-machine tender because they cover 3-6 machines with one wage.
  4. 4
    Pursue NIMS certifications (Level 1 β†’ Level 2) and CNC-specific training
    $22-28/hr with proven NIMS Level 1 across turning, milling, drill press, and measurement. Level 2 (Milling / Turning / Machining Level II) is programming-adjacent and unlocks the $30+/hr territory at aerospace and medical shops.
  5. 5
    Advance to lead operator / setup machinist / CNC programmer
    $28-38/hr + overtime. Lead operators own a cell of 6-12 machines and 2-5 tenders. Setup machinists own first-piece and complex fixture setup. CNC programmers move to CAM software (Mastercam, Esprit, Fusion 360, Siemens NX CAM) and program the machines the operators run β€” path to salaried manufacturing engineer at $70-95k.

Career Progression

Machine Tender / Loader (0-1 yrs)
0-1 yrs$34-40k ($16-19/hr) β€” near BLS p10-p25
  • β€’Load/unload parts to a single machine or a 2-machine paired cell
  • β€’Deburr, brush chips, apply coolant per shift-check procedure
  • β€’Log first-piece and per-cycle measurements to SPC sheet or Prolink software
  • β€’Escalate any dimensional drift to the operator or shift lead
Next: Cell operator after 6-12 months of accurate measurement work.
Cell Operator / Multi-Machine Operator (1-3 yrs)
1-3 yrs$40-50k ($19-24/hr) β€” near BLS p25-p50
  • β€’Run 2-4 machines in a cell (typically 1 lathe + 2 mills or 3-4 mills in a family)
  • β€’Edit tool offsets and wear compensation on Fanuc / Mitsubishi / Siemens controls
  • β€’Own SPC logs; keep Cpk above 1.33 on critical dimensions
  • β€’First-piece inspection on hand-off from setup machinist
Next: Sr cell operator or setup machinist at 3-5 years.
Sr Cell Operator / Setup Machinist (3-6 yrs)
3-6 yrs$48-60k ($23-29/hr) β€” near BLS p50 to p75
  • β€’Run 4-6 machines simultaneously in a cell; 5-axis experience preferred
  • β€’Own first-piece and complex fixture setup β€” soft jaws, custom vice jaws, tombstone loading
  • β€’Read GD&T prints and set up parts to datum callouts without programmer support
  • β€’Train new tenders and operators; certify them off cell workflow
Next: Lead operator or CNC programmer at 5-8 years.
Lead Operator / Cell Lead (5-9 yrs)
5-9 yrs$56-75k ($27-36/hr) β€” BLS p75 to p90
  • β€’Lead a shift cell of 6-12 machines and 2-5 tenders / operators
  • β€’Own shift throughput, first-pass yield, and SPC compliance
  • β€’Small-lot programming edits on Fanuc / Mitsubishi controls without CAM
  • β€’Interview and onboard new operators; write standard-work documents
Next: CNC programmer or manufacturing engineer at 8-12 years.
CNC Programmer / Manufacturing Engineer (salaried, 8+ yrs)
8+ yrs$68-98k salary (moves off BLS occupation into 51-4012 CNC Tool Programmers and 17-2112 Industrial Engineers)
  • β€’Program CNC machines in Mastercam, Esprit, Fusion 360, Siemens NX CAM, or GibbsCAM
  • β€’Design fixtures, tombstones, and workholding for production cells
  • β€’Optimize cycle time on high-volume production jobs (target 5-15% improvement per program review)
  • β€’Support operators in troubleshooting and post-processor tuning
Next: Sr manufacturing engineer / production supervisor at 12+ years.

Interview Questions & Answers

5 free questions below. Career Kit unlocks 16 total plus resume bullets for every level.

Q1. Walk me through your last cell β€” how many machines, what was the cycle-time balance?technical
Give the specifics: cell composition ('one Mori Seiki NLX-2500 lathe plus two Haas VF-3 mills plus a Fastems bar feeder'), cycle times per machine (lathe 4:20, mill A 6:40, mill B 6:15), and how you sequenced the load-unload rotation so no machine sat idle. Cycle-time balance is the operator's daily math β€” a cell where two machines finish at nearly the same second means you're always sprinting; a well-balanced cell has staggered finishes and lets one operator cover the full group. Weak candidates talk about the parts they made. Strong candidates talk about the balance and where they lost seconds to setup or measurement.
Q2. How do you set tool wear compensation on a Fanuc control?technical
On the Fanuc 30i / 31i, tool offsets live under the Offset key. Geometry offsets set at first-piece; wear offsets adjust in production without disturbing the geometry. If a diameter is running .0004" oversize after 40 cycles, I enter negative .0002" (radius, half of the diameter change) in the wear offset for that tool β€” I don't touch geometry. On Mitsubishi (M700 series) and Siemens (Sinumerik 828D), the offset structure is similar but the menu paths differ. Never dial in the change before I've verified it's a wear pattern and not a fixture issue or a coolant temperature change β€” reactive over-correction is the leading source of scrap.
Q3. Explain what Cpk 1.33 means and why aerospace shops track it.technical
Cpk is a process capability index β€” it measures how centered your process is inside the tolerance and how tight the variation is. Cpk 1.33 means the process is producing parts inside spec with 4-sigma margin at the closer tolerance limit β€” roughly 99.994% conformance if the distribution is normal. Aerospace primes (Boeing, Northrop, Lockheed) require Cpk 1.33 or higher on flight-critical characteristics; medical device (Stryker, Zimmer) requires similar levels on FDA-regulated features. Below Cpk 1.0 you're producing scrap in the tail of the distribution. Operators who understand Cpk make offset adjustments to keep the center of the distribution on nominal, not just chase the tolerance limit.
Q4. Tell me about a scrap incident you owned.behavioral
Give a real example with numbers. 'I ran a batch of 34 parts on a Haas VF-3 where the fixture stop had drifted .020" over the previous shift's cycles. First-piece measured on-nominal but by part 22 the position callout was drifting toward the tolerance limit. I flagged it at part 28 to the shift lead but had already sent 34 parts to inspection. QC scrapped 8; the rest were within tolerance. Root cause was a fixture stop I hadn't verified at first-piece. Corrective action: added a hard-stop verification step to my shift-check sheet, wrote it into standard work, and briefed the second-shift operator.' Interviewers want ownership, root cause, and the fix β€” not blame or excuses.
Q5. Why do you want to work at [aerospace / medical / automotive] instead of the others?closer
Pay + culture math. Aerospace (Boeing, Spirit AeroSystems, Lockheed shops) pays 15-25% above BLS median for cell operators with 5-axis fluency, but requires flight-critical documentation discipline that's not for everyone. Medical device (Stryker, Zimmer Biomet, Medtronic) pays similarly with FDA-regulated documentation and even tighter cleanliness protocols β€” great for detail-oriented operators. Automotive Tier 1 (Magna, Denso, ZF) pays 5-15% above BLS with high-volume production discipline β€” great for cycle-time-focused operators. Independent job shops offer the widest variety and often the fastest advancement path but with smaller pay ceilings. Pick and defend the lane based on the daily work you want, not just the pay.

Resume Template β€” Cell Operator / Multi-Machine Operator (1-3 yrs)

Copy these bullets into your resume as a starting point. Career Kit includes bullets for every level of the ladder.

Cell Operator / Multi-Machine Operator (1-3 yrs)
  • β–ΈRan a 4-machine cell (1 Mori Seiki NLX lathe + 3 Haas VF-3 mills) on 2nd shift at [Tier 1 automotive supplier] producing 380-520 pcs/shift.
  • β–ΈHeld Cpk 1.42 average across 6 critical dimensions on production run of 84,000 parts over 12 months; zero customer returns.
  • β–ΈFluent on Fanuc 31i and Mitsubishi M700 controls; edit tool offsets, wear compensation, and G54-G59 work coordinate systems.
  • β–ΈNIMS Level 1 in Milling, Turning, and Measurement. $22.50/hr + $1.75 shift differential + 401(k) match. Clean attendance record 98% over 20 months.

What Gets You Rejected

  • βœ—Cannot read a GD&T print or explain a position tolerance vs a profile tolerance β€” this is table-stakes for cell operator roles at any aerospace or medical shop.
  • βœ—No hands-on experience with digital calipers, micrometers, and gauge blocks β€” measurement fluency separates journeyman operators from tenders.
  • βœ—Weak SPC discipline β€” doesn't log per-cycle measurements, doesn't understand Cpk, over-adjusts offsets reactively.
  • βœ—Poor attendance or clock-punching discipline β€” every machine hour is a cost line, and a call-out on a 4-machine cell shift means the shift lead has to cover it themselves or accept lower throughput.
  • βœ—Refuses to work rotating shifts or overtime β€” most cells run 24/5 or 24/7 and the pay premium is on 2nd/3rd shift and weekend overtime.

Salary Negotiation Levers

  • βœ“5-axis experience β€” Mori Seiki DMU, DMG Mori NHX 6300, Makino a51nx, Haas UMC β€” worth $3-6/hr premium over 3-axis-only operators at aerospace shops.
  • βœ“NIMS certifications β€” Level 1 (baseline expectation), Level 2 (unlocks $30/hr territory), Level 3 (rare, pays $34-42/hr at aerospace and medical).
  • βœ“Aerospace / defense clearance eligibility β€” U.S. citizenship required, and a clearance-eligible operator is worth $4-8/hr premium at Boeing, Northrop, Lockheed classified programs.
  • βœ“Shift differentials β€” 2nd shift typically $1.50-2.50/hr, 3rd shift $2-4/hr, weekend overtime at 1.5x or 2x. Ask which shift is understaffed; that's the leverage.
  • βœ“Sign-on bonuses of $1-5k are common in tight labor markets (Wichita, Ohio Rust Belt, South Carolina auto corridor). Aerospace shops offering $8-15k signing bonuses for 5-axis operators is not unusual.
  • βœ“Tuition and cert reimbursement β€” most Tier 1 employers pay for NIMS certifications and community college tuition ($4-8k/yr) β€” direct wage compounding over 3-5 years.
  • βœ“Path to CNC programmer β€” get the promise in writing at hire, including the timeline (typically 3-5 years) and the CAM training the employer will pay for.

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Multiple Machine Tool Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic Salary by State

Best Cities (cost-adjusted) β†’

Salary Map β€” Click a state for details

$36K
$76Kβ–  No data

Top Paying States

West Virginia
$76K
+61%
Kentucky
$55K
+16%
Missouri
$53K
+13%
Maryland
$52K
+10%
Nebraska
$51K
+8%
Virginia
$51K
+7%
Washington
$51K
+7%
Vermont
$50K
+7%
Idaho
$50K
+7%
New York
$50K
+6%
Vertical line = national median. Click a state for full details.
StateMedianvs. National
West Virginia$76,080+61.3%
Kentucky$54,960+16.5%
Missouri$53,160+12.7%
Maryland$51,780+9.7%
Nebraska$50,960+8.0%
Virginia$50,600+7.2%
Washington$50,540+7.1%
Vermont$50,450+6.9%
Idaho$50,410+6.8%
New York$49,890+5.7%
1–10 of 45

Multiple Machine Tool Setters, Operators, and Tenders, Metal and Plastic Salary by Metro Area

Metro AreaMedianvs. National
Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX$80,110+69.8%
Charleston, WV$71,470+51.5%
Saginaw, MI$65,610+39.1%
Oshkosh-Neenah, WI$63,060+33.7%
Athens-Clarke County, GA$62,600+32.7%
St. Louis, MO-IL$62,090+31.6%
Ann Arbor, MI$61,320+30.0%
Rochester, NY$55,700+18.1%
Roanoke, VA$55,300+17.2%
Sioux City, IA-NE-SD$54,980+16.5%
1–10 of 196
Data Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS). Data reflects the most recent annual survey.
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