Plastic Injection Molding Cost-What Factors Will Affect It Significantly?
Injection molding is one of the common manufacturing processes where molten plastics are injected into molds. This process helps in creating small components used for designing bigger materials. Although it sounds easy, you need professional help with injection molding services. It may be costly to create molds. How much does it cost to make plastic injection molds? We will talk about the factors related to plastic injection molding costs.
Furthermore, the plastic injection molding process enables you to produce identical parts at low and high production rates. You can apply this technique to different types of plastics that can be melted by pressure and heat. Melted plastics infused into molds create the desired part.
Why choose plastic injection molding?
- A fast-high efficient production
Plastic injection involves the most efficient type of molding. It ensures a higher rate of production output. However, the size and other details of your mold can affect the speed. The pass between every cycle time is 15 to 120 seconds.
- Design complicated parts
Injection molding manages parts, consistency, and the ability to design several identical parts. To make injection molding more effective, professionals should focus on the major design elements. They will also increase the quality and precision of parts. The part design has to be created to ensure manufacturability. But, it is to be noted that mistakes in processing can become costly.
According to molding specialists, major design elements play an important role in the injection process for better functioning. These elements are rib design, wall thickness, weld lines, boss design, and gate placement.
Calculating the plastic injection molding cost
We have shared some details about the factors affecting this molding cost.
How complicated are your parts?
Intricacies of injection molds are one of the important factors for calculating the cost. Like other engineering projects, the level of complications of the design affects the overall cost. Moreover, injection parts that have several undercut features can be a costly option. You must not overlook the tooling cost. In the case of sharp corners, the tooling cost may be high.
Some molds may have a number of sharp corners. It will prevent the normal application of round cutters needed for machining. In this case, you need to apply EDM, a secondary process for your injection molding project. It may take time to make undercut features. Moreover, several adjustments have to be made to solve the issue.
Thus, the complication level of the part affects the amount you should invest in injection molds.
Number and size of cavities
A plastic mold manufacturing company needs to know how the number and size of cavities to properly quote an injection mold cost. The dimension of plastic components that have to be designed by the molding machine should correspond to the desired mold size. Highly advanced equipment and a small amount of space are essential for bigger molds.
The goals of your project are major factors in identifying how many cavities you should use. For instance, you have decided on molding 1 part. Thus, one cavity mold is needed to produce 1 part for every machine cycle. However, when you need multiple parts, you need more cavity molds to produce several parts for every machine cycle.
Multi-cavity mold indeed makes your project cost higher.
Type of resin
It is another relevant factor affecting the cost of your injection molding process. While choosing the resin, ingredients, additives, and number of components, professionals focus on the color, grade, and availability of resin. The resin chosen can also determine the maintenance needs of your mold. The use of abrasive resin will increase maintenance needs.
Different temperatures are needed for every type of thermoplastics. The mold cost will be on the rise for the high—temperature resin. Low-cost thermoplastics include polystyrene, polyethylene, and polypropylene. On the contrary, polyphenylene sulfide and polysulfone involve higher costs and temperatures.
Steel standard and type
Based on your budget and needs, it is essential to select the right type of steel for injection processes. As it is about manufacturing plastic injection mold, the qualities of PVC are highly important. The right type of steel should contact PVC. It is vital to know the reaction occurring between gasses.
Mold life is another factor affecting material cost. The highly durable steel lets you enjoy a longer mold life. Moreover, other relevant things include the surface finish, cycle time, and the number of parts needed for production.
Most commonly, plastic injection molding professionals use Be-copper, copper, S136, H13, Alloy, and P20. The incorrect selection of steel could cause a cracked cavity. To use better quality steel, you need to pay a higher amount for the molding process.
Tooling
The number of cavities chosen by professionals affects the tooling options. When your injection molds need several cavities, the project will be costlier. Minimal tooling is needed for a few cavities. However, there is an advantage of having an increased cavity. It helps in producing more parts per hour. The machine cost for every part will go down.
The dimension of parts is also associated with the tooling process. Larger molds involve larger parts. They will ultimately affect the production cost. When hiring mold manufacturers, you have to inform your purpose of using the injection mold. They will tell you about the tooling type needed for the project.
These are some factors influencing the plastic injection molding cost. You can choose Xcentric for plastic injection molding services at a reasonable price. It delivers high-quality molds within the shortest time. You can ask professionals to give you an estimate of their services.