Raising Repair Techs

United Tool & Mold, Inc. is a mold shop with a niche specialty in mold repair, so we geared our apprenticeship more towards the tear down and repair side of moldmaking—incorporating hot runners, preventive maintenance and troubleshooting, as these are the things that we do on a daily basis.  We don’t build new tools, so there was no reason to stay with the standard apprenticeship model; however, we still have the traditional classes/on-the-job training (OJT) hours for machining fundamentals, manual mills, lathe, grinding, etc,. We have classes for mechatronics (covers hydraulic and electrical), jig and fixture design and repair, hot runner basics (for repair/troubleshooting), preventive maintenance (machines), preventive maintenance (molds), troubleshooting molds, spotting, and polishing.  Both our CNC Operator and Repairman apprenticeships have the same classes for the first three years, with the final year getting more intensive into their chosen path. We have worked with Tri-County Technical College for most of the education classes as well as setting up industry experts to teach our hot runner and polishing classes.” Jeromy Arnett, Production Administration Manager, United Tool & Mold, Inc.