Equipment Investment Allows Moldmaker to Zero in Medical/Packaging Niches

Founded in 1972, the company specializes in mold design, pre-production molds through its R+D facility (Rapid Delivery), mold build, mold tryouts/validation at Tech Mold East where the company also builds completely integrated molding/ manufacturing systems that include automation, vision systems and downstream operations working with automation equipment suppliers.

According to Karl Szanto, Vice President Operations for Tech Mold, the medical disposable market offers ideal applications for Tech Mold’s capabilities of designing and building high-volume, multi-cavity molds that demanded repeatability and accuracy for those components, as well as interchangeability for customers’ global molding operations. The packaging industry, particularly caps and closures, have similar requirements. “The demands in those markets mesh well with Tech Mold’s capabilities, and have impacted our direction over the past 15 years,” he comments.

Equipment purchased includes a new Mitsubishi Wire EDM that is faster than the company’s current equipment. The new machine has an anti-electrolysis generator and cylindrical drive technology that means “zero back lash and zero wear on the ways,” notes Szanto. A new Mitsubishi Sinker EDM with Mitsubishi Robot has just been put into service. This combination equipment not only upgrades Tech Mold’s sinker equipment, but adding the robot allows the company to perform more lights-out operations to improve productivity, Szanto adds.

“Tech Mold is always investing in new equipment to meet the ever-increasing requirements of customers for faster time-to-market, cutting-edge molds to meet higher productivity, quality and efficiency demanded in today’s OEM molding environment,” Szanto says. “Having the latest, state-of-the-art equipment, cross-training our employees for shared technical know-how and partnering with premier mold component suppliers to develop new technology for larger, increasingly complex molds is key to our success.”

To market these new capabilities, Tech Mold is relying on its newly redesigned website, in addition to its “What is a Mold’ educational program the company offers to its customers and potential customers. “This program helps them understand why a high-speed, high-quality mold is essential for high production volumes demanded in the medical disposable and packaging markets,” Szanto states. “We have been offering this program for more than 15 years and it is a major component of our marketing program. We have great success with this approach and our clients recognize the benefits of this type of knowledge sharing.”

Szanto predicts strong growth in these markets over the next several years. “Customers in the medical disposable and the packaging (cap/closure) markets are requiring higher-cavitation molds, more ‘in-mold’ operations to reduce the need for parts handling and secondary operations, and ease of serviceability and mold maintenance,” he emphasizes. “We find that there is also a move to replace existing parts with redesigned thin-wall, more eco-friendly products.

“Mold manufacturers need to be much more than just ‘moldmakers’ in today’s manufacturing environment,” Szanto concludes. “They must be able to listen to the customer’s wants and needs—and be prepared to offer services and solutions such as total engineering, project management and development assistance.”