The plastic mold manufacturing landscape has been very competitive in the recent past as a large number of manufacturers are looking for efficient ways to save money. However, to reduce cost without sacrificing quality, all you need is to make design changes like choosing the right materials for the molds and reducing material waste.
In this blog, we will discuss how you can cut production costs without taking shortcuts. Let’s begin with the basic one: improving mold design.
1. Optimize Mold Design
The choice of your mold design has a great influence on the cost of production costs. Simplifying the mold design improves overall efficiency, reduces designing expenses, and helps avoid unnecessary remolding. Making complex design will increase cycle time, waste materials, and increase initial tooling costs.
Strategies to optimize mold design:
- Simplify mold design: The design of a mold has a direct cost implication to the overall production costs. To be effective, make your mold as simple as possible. This means you eliminate unnecessary design that will inflate costs and extends cycles. For instance, undercuts should be removed entirely to lower machining time.
- Use Design for Manufacturability (DFM) Principles: The designs you have should comply with set design standards. Work hand in hand with a manufacturer in the initial designing stage. This will make it easy to spot potential mistakes and design faults before production starts.
For example, in one of the initial design stages, a manufacturer assessed a multi-cavity mold and decreased the cavity count from 8 to 6. The change not only made the designing simpler it also made the machining faster hence lowering the tooling costs by 20%
2. Choose the Right Materials
The material used is very important because it determines the overall cost of the production process. A proper material ensures that you get high-quality products at a reduced cost.
To achieve this, you need to use:
- Cost-Effective Materials:
You need to make sure you select cost-effective materials that do not sacrifice performance.
Sometimes, investing in more high-quality materials upfront will help prevent frequent repairs and premature failures. For instance, one plastic mold manufacturing team opted for a high-grade P20 tool steel core for a component prone to high wear. This decision resulted in reduced downtime and fewer repairs by a 30% margin, saving roughly $7,500 per year.
- Recycled Materials:
When designing non-critical parts, its okay to opt for recycled materials. This choice will lower the expenses and meet performance standards.
- Mold Materials:
In the early days of the design stage, take time to analyze the material properties and consult with experts. This will ensure you avoid unforeseen expenses while maintaining quality.
3. Invest in Efficient Manufacturing Processes
One of the key reasons for modernizing manufacturing processes is to reduce operating costs. Integrating modern technology into your manufacturing processes improves production efficiency while keeping the costs low.
Strategies to improve manufacturing process efficiency
- Automation
Automation and efficiency go hand in hand. When done right, it enhances precision and speeds up production cycles. This, as a result, reduces costs. Companies speed up their production cycles by introducing automated molding systems and assigning human resources to more complex tasks.
- Energy-Efficient Machinery
Integrating modern technology increases the efficiency of the production process while minimizing energy consumption. This reduces the overall production cost.
By integrating automated quality checks, one company experienced a reduction in defective parts and the need for replacement by 50%. This led to increased efficiency and cut power consumption by 20–30%, directly reducing operational costs.
- Optimize Cooling Systems
Investing in advanced cooling systems helps reduce costs and improve efficiency. Systems such as conformal cooling channels that mirror the mold’s shape help reduce cycle time and cut costs by up to 25%.
Working with a reputable plastic mold factory will give you access to advanced technologies and techniques that not only help save money but also increase innovation and scalability.
4. Reduce Waste and Improve Mold Maintenance
Reducing material waste and maintaining quality molds always go hand in hand. When mold maintenance is done correctly and on time, it leads to reduced material wastage and as a result, lowers the overall costs. This reduces the chances of abrupt and unplanned downtimes.
Here’s what you need to streamline everything:
- Process Control
To improve mold performance and reduce waste, one needs to keep a trade-off between cost and suitability of the material used.
The best way to balance cost and quality is by evaluating the properties of different materials and considering factors such as durability, ease of processing, and availability.
- Regular Mold Maintenance
Molds need to be cleaned regularly for them to perform at their best. Also, it’s important to track wear patterns and replace components before failure.
- Preventive Maintenance
Make it a requirement to have a well-structured preventive maintenance plan; it will be significantly easier to notice wear and tear early and schedule inspections and maintenance. This prevents costly repairs and prolongs the mold life.
For example, a plastic mold factory decided to implement a proactive maintenance schedule in order to counteract the effects of wear and tear on time. This resulted in unplanned downtime to fall by 60%, saving $16,000 annually. This intentional approach ensures that your manufacturing process remains efficient, cost-effective, and consistent in quality.
Conclusion
Lowering plastic mold manufacturing costs should not be about cutting corners–it should be about making the right choices and applying working strategies.
To make sure you balance cost and quality, you’ll need to optimize your mold design, select the right materials, modernize your manufacturing processes, and implement rigorous waste reduction and maintenance routines. This is the only way to reduce the costs without compromising quality.
