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Plastics: Whether 3-D or Injection Molded, They’re Cool, eh ‘Lit’!

There’s a famous scene in “The Graduate”, the iconic 60’s movie that made a star out of Dustin Hoffman, and which besmirched a material that 50 years later has made a stunning comeback. It comes at a graduation party for Hoffman’s character:  one of the adult party-goers corrals “Ben”, the Hoffman character, leads him outside…

Filed Under:plastic injection molded electronic parts , Plastic Injection Molding Methods

Truths of Plastic Injection Molding Re-shoring & Automation

It’s hard to drill down to the facts these days — on any topic.  The surfeit of information precipitated by digital media (read: the internet) has confused and distracted almost everyone from the truth about everything. Manufacturing is no exception.  Just mentioning the words off-shoring, re-shoring and  automation is to beg an instant argument.  But…

Filed Under:medical dental plastic supplies , Plastic Injection Molding Medical Parts , Uncategorized

‘Ooho’: The ‘Dippin Dots’ of the Plastic Bottle Industry

In the late ’80s, visitors to county fairs, amusement parks and other mega-outdoor venues began seeing a new kind of  frozen treat which was billed as the evolutionary descendant of ice cream. Marketed as “Dippin’ Dots:  The Ice Cream of the Future,”  this new “revolutionary” dessert was touted by its founders as a disruptive entry…

Filed Under:Plastic food packaging

Take the Guesswork Out of Plastic Injection Molding Warpage

Plastic injection mold manufacturers have a nemesis when it comes to resolving warpage.  The culprit is the gap between the conventional assumptions, i.e. guesswork,  of mold temperature warpage and actual warpage of parts that occur in real time. Because of advances in software technology, including software simulation packages, trial and error experiments at the production…

Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding Methods

Make Your Bottom Line Come Alive With Living Hinges

Many people have heard of “living wills.”  And everybody knows what a “living room” is.  But how many people, outside the plastic injection molding industry, have heard of a “living hinge”? Unlike the aforementioned “living” examples, a living hinge is a thin flexible hinge fabricated from the same material as the two rigid pieces it…

Filed Under:Plastic Caps and Closures

In Medical Device Manufacturing, Small is Increasingly Beautiful

There’s big profit in small plastic medical parts, which is prompting leading medical molders to make big changes of their own.  How small are these parts?  Try tenths-of-a-millimeter small.  This is a quantum leap forward — or downward, if you will — for these plastic injection molders. And the medical devices that they are manufacturing…

Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding Medical Parts

Like Lake Wobegon, Our Industry Is Above Average

Although Garrison Keillor retired from Prairie Home Companion in 2016,  his sardonic tagline lives on:  “and that’s the news from Lake Wobegon, where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average.” While not true for every last plastic injection molder in the US,  the “above average” appellation…

Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding News

How to keep your molding machines happy (and profitable!)

Like cats and dogs, the production manager and the maintenance manager constantly feud for machine time in many plastic injection molding plants. Unfortunately, production usually wins because it generates revenue and maintenance is considered overhead.  Routine maintenance on molding machines is sacrificed on the altar of profit. Of course, if maintenance is delayed too long… well, you know…

Filed Under:Uncategorized