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What do you consider cheap? Last time I looked, injection molding machines were decidedly not cheap. Furthermore, the cost of a set of molds can run into the r

What do you consider cheap? Last time I looked, injection molding machines were decidedly not cheap. Furthermore, the cost of a set of molds can run into the range of 6 to 7 figures.

mlyle 1y ago
Molds intended for large production are expensive, but it's going to be expensive no matter where you do it (and can be procured internationally if you want). If you're making something with injection molding, you will need a mold. (Aluminum or even SLA tooling is possible for smaller batches). That said, even good steel tooling does not necessarily cost above low 5 figures. It all depends on what you're trying to do. Real injection molding machines are $10k-300k, depending on what you want / need. This is not very exciting or scary from a capital expenditure point of view. Yes, you can spend a lot more if you're producing a -lot-. That $200k machine can get you to thousands of shots per day.
- tanvach 1y ago
  Many moons ago, we looked into doing molds for injection molding in US and China for a simple plastic part. The US based companies quoted 10x more expensive, while the Chinese company we ended up with offered more features (over molding with TPU) at cheaper initial and unit prices, and really great customer service walking through optimizing the part design with us. We were very happy with them. It made it possible to get our product to be economical. Might be worth doing a test and order from your Chinese competitor to see how things look from your customers perspective.
jjk166 1y ago
The injection mold machine is typically less expensive than the tool you put in the machine. The largest one I have is a $150k (new) machine, it runs a $200k mold which makes 2 million parts per year for a $14 million per year production line. This isn't the sort of thing you buy for the home shop, but as far as business capex goes it's nothing. If you buy used you can get a decent machine for $20k, assuming what you're making isn't stupidly large (bigger parts need bigger molds which need bigger presses). There's some labor to do mold maintenance, but for the most part these things run themselves. As long as you can sell what you're making, they're about as close as you can get to a money printer.

What do you consider cheap? Last time I looked, injection molding machines were decidedly not cheap. Furthermore, the cost of a set of molds can run into the range of 6 to 7 figures.

mlyle 1y ago

Molds intended for large production are expensive, but it's going to be expensive no matter where you do it (and can be procured internationally if you want). If you're making something with injection molding, you will need a mold. (Aluminum or even SLA tooling is possible for smaller batches). That said, even good steel tooling does not necessarily cost above low 5 figures. It all depends on what you're trying to do. Real injection molding machines are $10k-300k, depending on what you want / need. This is not very exciting or scary from a capital expenditure point of view. Yes, you can spend a lot more if you're producing a -lot-. That $200k machine can get you to thousands of shots per day.

tanvach 1y ago
Many moons ago, we looked into doing molds for injection molding in US and China for a simple plastic part. The US based companies quoted 10x more expensive, while the Chinese company we ended up with offered more features (over molding with TPU) at cheaper initial and unit prices, and really great customer service walking through optimizing the part design with us. We were very happy with them. It made it possible to get our product to be economical. Might be worth doing a test and order from your Chinese competitor to see how things look from your customers perspective.

jjk166 1y ago

The injection mold machine is typically less expensive than the tool you put in the machine. The largest one I have is a $150k (new) machine, it runs a $200k mold which makes 2 million parts per year for a $14 million per year production line. This isn't the sort of thing you buy for the home shop, but as far as business capex goes it's nothing. If you buy used you can get a decent machine for $20k, assuming what you're making isn't stupidly large (bigger parts need bigger molds which need bigger presses). There's some labor to do mold maintenance, but for the most part these things run themselves. As long as you can sell what you're making, they're about as close as you can get to a money printer.