The Challenge

Our customer came to Industrial Molds with an interesting and complex mold project. They challenged us to build an insert molded tool with multishot capabilities while utilizing advanced automation for the molding process. Multishot injection molding is a process where two or more colors and/or materials are injected simultaneously into a mold, creating one or multiple components. There were a lot of moving parts to this project and collaboration was key.

Program management was critical in order to provide a full turnkey cell for the customer. We worked together with our customer to get a comprehensive understanding of their needs, relied heavily on our internal design engineers, and DevLinks for the robotics design integration.

The Engineering

Our engineers designed moldable and manufacturable parts within the footprint provided. There were two different part designs needed for three separate product lines. The Industrial Molds team, molding machine vendors, and the automation house worked together and developed robust designs which satisfied and exceeded the customer requirements.

The Manufacturing

The internal collaboration continued during the mold build process; our manufacturing and engineering teams worked closely during the design phase, and a comprehensive manufacturing plan was established prior to the customer design approval. The mold builds went as planned and stayed on schedule with no major issues. The first shots from each mold were high quality – only minor tweaking after the initial builds were necessary to get the molds into production. We take pride in blending design and manufacturing so the time to market is reduced considerably.

Summary

Our customer was very pleased and able to get their products to market quickly. We continue to be the “go-to” mold manufacturer for this valued customer and have successfully produced several complex molds for them.

“My experience with Industrial Molds has been fantastic. The mold design process was incredibly painless. Industrial Molds is skilled at gaining a full understanding of our needs first. They work seamlessly with myself (a design and development engineer), our Industrial Engineers and molding experts, and a third part automation company to make the project a success. The mold ran correctly the first time and only needed minor modifications after the first trials. All communication was quick, efficient, and professional. Thanks again, everyone, for the great work!”

– Tim Forbes, Lead Production Development Engineer Kreg Tool Company