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DESIGNERS A Bridge from Conception to Production
Integration
The knowledge, experience and industry connections of China Array’ materials, design and process engineers cuts across virtually all market segments worldwide providing a powerful “front-end” for China Array. A fully integrated high performance thermoplastics (HPTP) molder in China provides a competitive “back-end”. The combination of talented multinational engineers and solid Chinese manufacturing positions the company to integrate forward into the design and development of products, a growing trend in several industries, and backward into doing complete production, assembly and packaging in China, another growing trend. A multi-disciplined team, focused on market applications and product commercialization, can envision multiple possibilities for a product and give the customer a competitive edge in the market place. Manufacturability
One of the first things China Array reviews with a designer is the manufacturability of a potential product. Can a concept be modified to reduce tooling costs, improve processing, eliminate post molding operations and assembly, and/or enhance functionality and appearance? Bringing experienced manufacturers in at an early stage can greatly benefit the final product. Materials Selection Dialog between China Array's applications engineers (AE) and the design team hones in on the properties needed for the proposed product and leads to the selection of the proper material: a process that may go through several iterations as the product develops. AE's have an encyclopedic knowledge of and access to a huge variety of HPTP resins and compounded hybrids that can meet (or exceed) the perceived requirements of a design concept: structural strength, friction and wear resistance, weatherability, thermal, chemical and UV resistance, fire retardation. . . whatever is necessary, and always with the intention of securing the fullest range of properties most cost effectively. The key is than an experienced AE can predict in advance how something will look, feel, and function before a single part is produced. (Please click here for a "real world" example of the Materials Selection Process.)
Functionality & Appearance An example illustrates how function, appearance and cost can intersect at manufacturing. Large, thick walled parts that would be too heavy or prohibitively expensive if made completely from plastic are instead molded using a method known as gas assist injection molding, which introduces air into the part to substitute for expensive plastics allowing a part to keep sufficient structural integrity while reducing weight and cost. However, gas assist injection molding creates a honeycomb effect that may not satisfy surface finish requirements. Counter pressure injection molding, a variation on gas assist injection molding, seals the honeycomb structure inside the part while leaving an attractive, smooth surface. The molding process merges functionality, appearance and cost to create the best product from the design. Prototypes & Information
Prototype molds, mechanically simple and built from low cost steel, generate an enormous amount of useful information about a product. A prototype mold can produce up to 10,000 pieces for large scale field testing, and the molded parts are made from the same material the actual production parts will be made from (a limitation for single sample Rapid Prototyping methods). By building a mold, the customer gains valuable information on mold design and the injection molding process, all of which is stored electronically, greatly increasing the probability of having large scale production go smoothly , and giving the company a jump on design of the next generation of product. Tooling & Production Armed with the information from materials selection, manufacturability review and prototypes a high caliber production mold can be built to suit the application. The injection molding information gleaned from small scale prototype runs can be applied to large scale production. Following the steps above will help a designer realize the full potential of his or her concept. |
