Desktop Manufacturing Part 2: Injection Molding

[Ace-Garageguy]

Some time back, in a "kit review" thread that had a bad habit of running off the rails into "the kit manufacturers should do this and do that" (but with little grounding in the economic and technical realities of the model-kit-manufacturing industry as it exists), I posted several links to videos that illustrate pretty well what some of today's low-volume manufacturing options are, how they work, and a little about what they can do in the not-too-distant future.

I don't think the majority here saw most of this info, so I'm going to post a 3-part series of links to what can be done TODAY in LOW-VOLUME DESKTOP MANUFACTURING. The technologies are game changers, can conceivably keep the scale-model hobby alive and well for decades to come, and take a capital-intensive industrial business model and put it within reach of a middle-class guy working on his own.

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PART 2: We've been told repeatedly that the injection molding process takes hundreds of thousands of dollars invested in design and tooling, and because of that, it's impossible to develop and manufacture short-run subjects with limited appeal, while making enough money to sustain a business. The capability of the little injection-molding machine in the video below pretty much blows that "truth" out of the water. It's a small machine making small parts...but it makes them FAST. As it stands, it could revolutionize the "resin" parts aftermarket, allowing very high quality parts to be manufactured quickly without all the rigamarole associated with resin-casting.

But the big idea to take away from this video is that this tech is scalable. All that means, in this context, is that it's not difficult to build larger machines capable of squirting out an entire 1/25 body, or an entire sprue of smaller parts.

 

 

[Exotics_Builder]

Even more interesting

[Dave Van]

Interesting.......but even more questions.  What does tooling cost on a mold this size??? Is there a tooling shop in the USA that can build these molds economically?  What is the max OZ of each shot?? What does the injection machine cost?? What plastics can be used?? Their cost? Many more but unless these are all answered in a way to make it work on a model car level...it doesn't matter. But cool info. 

[Ace-Garageguy]

9 minutes ago, Dave Van said:

Interesting.......but even more questions.  What does tooling cost on a mold this size??? Is there a tooling shop in the USA that can build these molds economically?  What is the max OZ of each shot?? What does the injection machine cost?? What plastics can be used?? Their cost? Many more but unless these are all answered in a way to make it work on a model car level...it doesn't matter. But cool info. 

Suffice it to to say it's entirely doable, cost effectively. I've researched everything here sufficiently to be 100% convinced of that.

See part 3 for more tooling information that goes farther, and pulls the first two videos together in terms of what's possible with some effort.

There are many companies capable of making injection-molding dies in the US, and there always have been. I've talked to some, and most have been very willing to try to compete cost-wise with the Chinese.

But this isn't currently my job. I'm not a paid consultant to anyone at the moment, and I'm simply not going to do all the numbers and present an exhaustively researched and documented set of instructions just because I'm a nice guy. I've presented sufficient information for anyone motivated and net savvy to go as far as they would like with this stuff...

...or, I AM available as a paid engineering, product-and-process-development consultant.  

Edited December 10, 2018 by Ace-Garageguy

[Dave Van]

thanks!

[Ace-Garageguy]

PS: The little injection molding machine was available for $3500 or so when I first became aware of it. Nothing in it is rocket-science, and something like it could be fairly easily reverse-engineered form the video alone by a competent mechanical engineer or a skilled technical hobbyist-machinist.

And don't forget...this thing can easily be scaled up to a size that could do one model car body, or a complete average kit sprue.