CASE STUDY
PRODUTION-READY INJECTION MOLD TOOLING IN DAYS, NOT WEEKS
“PRODUCTION TOOLING IN PROTOTYPE TIME”
NICOLET PLASTICS INVESTS IN MANTLE METAL 3D PRINTING TECHNOLOGY TO PRODUCE MOLD TOOLING
HIGHLIGHTS
Nicolet Plastics has invested in the Mantle metal 3D printing technology to provide injection molded parts more quickly to its customers.
Production-ready plastic injection mold inserts are printed in H13 tool steel.
For the 3 printed inserts, toolmaking hands on operations were reduced from 180 hours to 10 hours, and total lead time for molded parts was reduced from 6 weeks to 2 weeks.
A complex insert that would have been outsourced to a different tool maker could be manufactured in-house.
About nicolet
With decades of experience in mold-making and plastic molding, Nicolet Plastics has long used the tag line “Fast, Fluid and Flexible” which accurately describes the company’s ability to quickly respond to customer requests, from quoting through delivered parts.
Today, the company operates over 40 presses ranging from 30 to 610 tons, with semi- and fully automated processes integrated into molding operations to support lower costs and competitive lead times.
SUMMARY
Nicolet Plastics, a full-service plastic injection molder in Wisconsin with extensive in-house toolmaking capabilities, invested in Mantle’s metal 3D printing technology to produce production-ready plastic injection mold cavity and core inserts using H13 tool steel in just days, significantly reducing both the lead time and cost associated with producing tooling.
Nicolet can now fulfill customer requests far faster than if they were only using traditional toolmaking processes. In a recent project for their customer Gamber-Johnson, Nicolet printed 3 tooling components with Mantle’s technology and reduced the time to deliver molded parts from six weeks to just two weeks
“WE PRINTED THE INSERTS…(AND) DID A LITTLE BIT OF FINAL FITTING HERE AND THERE AND WE WERE ABLE TO GET IT IN THE PRESS AND START MOLDING PARTS QUICKLY. WE ONLY HAD ABOUT 10 HOURS’ WORTH OF SECONDARY OPERATIONS AND FINAL FITTING. OUR TOOL MAKER, WHILE INITIALLY DOUBTFUL ABOUT THE TECHNOLOGY, WAS SO SURPRISED AT THE QUALITY OF THE INSERT HE WAS ALMOST JUMPING UP AND DOWN FOR JOY.”
-eric derner, nicolet plastics
application example: gamber – johnson
To produce components for Gamber-Johnson, Nicolet had to overcome a number of challenges familiar to molders, starting with the need to produce molded parts quickly. The challenging geometry of the part – including multiple steeply angled faces and a series of thin ribs – would typically mean that the tooling inserts would require significant sinker EDM time and would take six weeks to fabricate.
The final molded parts
Instead, Mantle printed the three tooling inserts using Mantle’s 3D printer and H13 tool steel. After minor finishing work, they assembled the inserts in a mold base and began molding parts. The entire process, including printing, finishing, assembling the mold base, and starting molding, took less than two weeks.
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