Custom on-demand manufacturing company Fictiv is working to help get its injection molding customers’ products to market faster by giving them a primer on product design as well as launching several platform upgrades.
In August, Fictiv announced that it was expanding its injection molding manufacturing partner network in the U.S. to help give clients more flexibility and to ease supply chain challenges. According to the company’s 2022 State of Manufacturing Report, 65 percent of U.S. manufacturing companies want to increase onshore production due to global supply chain disruptions. That figure could possibly increase as geopolitical tensions between China and the U.S. escalate and manufacturing hubs in the Asia Pacific and India are still ramping up capacity.
Fictiv raised $100 million to fund the growth of its platform that streamlines the manufacturing process for a number of industries. Its injection molding segment is suited to industries like medical, electronics, construction, food and beverage, agriculture and consumer goods, where companies can get parts produced for as little as pennies. Customers can get quotes for orders with no minimum quantities, receive T1 samples in as little as two weeks and select domestic production.
The platform shows promise for the medical industry. In one case study, Fictiv was able to significantly improve production time for TransMed7’s medical devices. The company develops devices for advanced biopsy diagnostics and cardiovascular intervention procedures and required a faster and more cost-efficient turnaround on parts and a partner that could help scale production to meet customer demand. Fictiv’s platform was able to help TransMed7 cut design and development time from weeks to days and production from months to weeks. The company’s accelerated final design commercial NPI shrank from ten years to two years for five new breakthrough medical devices, saving millions in infrastructure and overhead costs.
“Injection molding plays a critical role in scaling the product offerings for several business units of our organization,” said Dr. James Vetter, cofounder and chief medical officer of TransMed7. “With today’s continuing concerns about unexpected supply chain issues, it is immensely comforting to have Fictiv as a partner, not just for overseas production but also for domestic manufacturing resources.”
To help accelerate turnaround further, Fictiv recently launched an online design for manufacturing (DFM) portal that enables customers to get design feedback faster than the old way of sending documents back and forth via email.
“The DFM process for injection molding is ripe for technology innovation because of how complex it is, how much time it takes, and how inconsistent it can be,” said Chris Lippi, chief product officer at Fictiv. “Our new online DFM experience for injection molding guides our customers through a unique and interactive design dialogue with Fictiv. We are now one step closer to an automated DFM experience that is currently delivered as part of our CNC and 3D printing offerings, and this is just the beginning.”
The Complex DFM Process
One of Fictiv’s key services is providing DFM feedback for customers. Robbie Long, technical applications engineer for Injection Molding at Fictiv, discussed the value of getting customers thinking about their product designs. Some of the trends he’s seeing among injection molding customers are increased demand for parts for cars, chargers and electrical storage units as part of the green energy expansion; high demand for medical molding post-pandemic; an emphasis on recyclability and lightweight, high-performance plastics.
Customers are often still in the design phases when they reach out for production quotes. Fictiv engineers use the opportunity to step in and help customers understand critical aspects of the manufacturing process like part tolerances.
Fictiv offers the following seven questions to help customers make the most of the injection molding DFM process:
- Which injection molding tolerances must be specified?
- What are standard injection molding tolerances for parts?
- How does overall size and wall thickness affect part tolerance?
- Why is material selection so important for calculating shrinkage?
- How does tooling affect plastic injection molding tolerances?
- What’s the relationship between T1 tests and part tolerances?
- Where can you get help with plastic injection molding tolerances?
In terms of injection molding tolerances, the main aspects to consider are dimensional tolerances for the dimensions of the overall part as well as for sections within the part. Long says that warping is an issue that can easily arise with injection molding, so understanding a customer’s straightness requirements is key to delivering what they’re trying to accomplish. Hole diameters are important, especially in designing parts with fasteners and off-the-shelf items that have their own tolerances, where the depth of holes and concentricity of circles and ovals must be considered.
“Overall, the biggest concern is just making sure that the customer is designing for whatever other part they’re mating to,” said Long.
When determining overall tolerances, one of the first things that Long asks is, what mating assembly of all parts involved will produce tolerances that will work for the final product?
Material selection is another critical area for DFM. Fictiv provides access to 30 different materials for injection molding in addition to custom materials upon request. One of the essential questions to ask about a given material is its shrink rate, because it varies from material to material, according to Long. Shrink rates are determined by the material suppliers and affect how parts perform after the molding process.
“It’s critical to understand shrink rates and tool design,” said Long. “The design of the tool plays into the shrink rate—there can be a different shrink rate for the width of the part compared to the length. So the tool design is important regarding how the parts are actually going to be produced.”
Another consideration to be aware of regarding material selection is the heat tolerance of the material. Vendors should supply information about the level of heat the tool should reach during processing. It’s one of the many topics that Long says Fictiv engineers discuss with customers. With so many materials available, each with its own advantages, like electrical conductivity, insulating properties, heat deflection, hardness, impact resistance and more, customers must evaluate the end use of their products and pick materials that are suitable. Long says that material distributors can typically provide more in-depth material specs.
Regarding the relationship between T1 tests and part tolerances, Long says that the testing process is a good representation of what can be achieved in the final part production. It serves as an opportunity for the customer to make the necessary changes to attain the desired outcome. Fictiv provides T1 parts that are produced according to the design but sometimes issues arise like warping. So, the T1 phase allows issues to be addressed and design changes to be ahead of mass production.