PLASTIC INJECTION MOULD TOOLS AND PLASTIC INJECTION MOULDING
CRDM specialises in providing injection mould tooling and plastic moulding services to suit many different situations. Our expert team can help choose the best route get the mould tool that suits your needs whether that is just 50 plastic injection mouldings as fast as possible or a suite of production injection mould tools with OEE and full APQP compliance. Applications can also include die casting tooling, blow moulding tools and press tooling. Call our team to discuss how we can help.
Injection Mould Tool services from CRDM
DMLS Plastic Injection Mould Tool Inserts
Using the power of Additive Layer Manufacturing (ALM) we can produce complex mould tool core and cavity inserts using our DMLS tooling technology in very short time frames. This means that an injection mould tool can be designed, manufactured and mounted onto our standard bolster system and be moulding within 3 days.
DMLS Injection mould tool inserts can be built in either nickel bronze alloy (DM20) for ultimate speed, or in maraging steel (MS) which can be hardened upto 52 HRC.
Tooling Inserts with Conformal Heating/Cooling
A growing use for DMLS tooling inserts is in conformal cooling of production injection mould tools. Freeform channels are built into the mould tool component, directly from the 3D cad in hardenable maraging tool steel. This allows heating or cooling gases and fluids to work extremely efficiently in difficult geometries without the need for multiple drillings. Conformal cooling enables significantly faster cycle times when moulding and can also solve many difficult heating or cooling problems within the tool. These can include situations where the mould tool geometry prevents standard drilling techniques (ejection systems or side cores for example) from getting close to the tool zone, this allows weld and knit lines to be minimised or removed, fast and uniform cooling of the plastic moulding even with part section changes or hot spots. Conformal cooling channels can also follow complex paths through and around tool insert features to take cooling or heating where it is required, while at the same time reducing or even eliminating the risk of leak and minimising tool maintenance down time.
Inserts can be provided to toolmakers as near net shaped mould tool inserts ready for final machining and finishing or as fully finished inserts or as part of a complete injection mould tool.
Plastic Injection Moulding
CRDM has a range of plastic injection moulding machines in house and can run experimental material trials up to high volume production batches of plastic parts. CRDM works with a wide variety of industries and therefore has experience and expertise in running many plastics including those that require high temperature oil heating.
High Speed Machined Aluminium or Steel Injection Mould Tools
When a specific surface finish or high accuracy are required that cannot be achieved using DMLS mould tools we can manufacture mould tools using our fast, 3D cad/cam driven cnc milling, wiring and spark erosion machines. Streamlined processes and highly trained toolmakers allow us to produce mould tools that meet your requirements.
Mould Tool Project Management
CRDM understands that injection mould tooling is a complex and high added value commitment for our customers. Therefore experience, expertise and above all open communication between toolmaker and client are essential to successful tooling projects.
Our tooling project managers have many years of experience delivering mould tools and plastic parts while exceeding customer expectation. Our team will advise on potential part design issues, tool specification, material selection and ensure all project deliverables are achievable.
For large tooling projects CRDM has a group of carefully selected injection mould toolmakers in the UK and overseas* that can provide the toolmaking capability to produce large suites of production injection mould tools to a very high standard with particular focus on mould tools for the automotive industry. Our dedicated plastic injection mould tool project management team ensure that your project runs smoothly and your mould tools and plastic mouldings are delivered on time and to the required standard.
*CRDM have a project manager based in China who oversees our tooling and moulding work. Ken Adams, ex-CRDM UK, is an experienced engineer who adds value and insight to overseas projects.