Greetings all,

I’m new to this board and to the industry; I own a small company that makes toys. We currently use RTV tooling for Polyurethane models but with the need to produce a larger quantity of our product we have recently taken the plunge into the exciting world of injection molding… and now my head hurts

We work from CAD files to create our models and then it’s off for a Stereo Lithograph master to pull the mold from. We will be CNC milling the masters and molds in the future, but having never created molds for plastic injection molding I am at a loss for requirements such as ejector pins and other mold specific design traits. The projected sales are not known at this time so having an experienced mold maker create our molds is not cost effective at this time. I just can’t justify the 20+k to have a pro shop handle this if I cannot know the possible sales.

This leads me to my next questions…

Are there services that will use MUD tooling as a base and drop our mold inserts in (with required modifications for things like ejection pins)?

Is there a shop(s) that works with It’s customers to help with mold design issues, where the customer prefers to handle most of the mold production but lacks the experience to go from A to Z?

Are there differences in mold design for injection molding and RIM molding?

Are there CAD files out there with “blank mold” tool designs to use as reference in creating our molds?

Are there any resources that you can think of, companies, books etc. that you think could help us through our first production mold.

Are there US companies that offer full mold services at discounted prices in return for future business…. I know the answer to this one ;)

Thank you for your help!

Mark-

DreamForge-Games