6 Ways to Lower Injection Molding Costs

Demand for plastic injection molding continues to grow, with the injection molding industry expanding at a compound annual growth rate of 6 percent, on track to grow in value from $212.82 billion in 2016 to $359.80 billion by 2025, Coherent Market Insights projects. The need for lightweight, fuel-efficient automotive components and food and container packaging is helping drive market growth. For these applications and others, plastic molding is an efficient, affordable, smart solution. Here are six advantages that Universal Plastic Mold offers to its clients.

1. Lower Cost

Cost is one of the big benefits of that plastic mold manufacturers offer. While the initial cost of making a mold can be thousands of dollars, once the mold is made, a large quantity of products can be manufactured at a relatively low cost per unit. This makes plastic injection molding more cost-efficient than other methods.

2. Volume Production

The cost advantages of plastic injection molding become most pronounced for large-volume production runs. Even though 3D printing has become increasingly popular for prototyping and small-scale production, after a certain production volume, plastic injection molding remains the most cost-efficient method. Whether 3D printing or plastic injection molding is your most cost-efficient option depends on how many units you need and the specifics of your product design. For example, with current technology, if plastic injection molding costs $10,000 to produce a mold and $0.20 per unit, and if 3D printing costs $20 per unit, plastic injection molding becomes more cost-efficient if you are producing over 500 units.

3. Automation Efficiency

Another major advantage of plastic injection molding is automation efficiency. A plastic mold company uses a highly-automated procedure that employs machinery and robots that can be controlled by a single operator. This significantly reduces both labor costs and manufacturing costs, generating savings that get passed on to the client. It also enables products to be produced more rapidly for maximum production efficiency.

4. Design Precision

The automated nature of plastic injection molding enables great design precision. Plastic molding uses computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing, which allows for highly precise specifications. Plastic molds are accurate within .005 inches. This provides extremely close tolerance for better quality control.

5. Design Flexibility

The computer-aided precision of plastic injection molding also provides excellent design flexibility. The combination of digital design with precision tolerance provides designers a great deal of structural freedom. It’s also easy to use the same mold with different materials or product colors. Co-injection molding even enables different types of plastic to be used simultaneously. High pressure used during the molding process also supports intricate detailing of parts.

6. Design Strength

In addition to providing design flexibility, plastic injection molding enables solid design strength. The plastic molding process allows fillers to be used in injection molds which reduce the density of plastic during molding and add strength to parts after molding is completed. This makes plastic injection molding well-suited to industries where high product strength is required.

When you add it all up, it’s no wonder this process is experienced such a boom in popularity. If you’d like to learn more about how your business can benefit from injection molding, speak to the experts at Universal Plastic Mold today.