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Fast Shipping! 13-Day Standard | Injection Molding

Fast Shipping! 13-Day Standard | Injection Molding

Sep 19, 2019 | Additive Manufacturing, Injection Molding, Rapid Manufacturing

Need Fast Shipping For Injection Molding? Xcentric Now Offers 13-Day Standard Delivery!

Fast shipping – yes! We are excited to offer injection molding customers Xcentric Fast shipping, our new 13-day standard delivery – a full 48 hours less than the previous standard delivery, to support their clients in meeting growing customer demands.

“Most of our clients have expressed their struggle to meet the increased market pressure to get products to market faster,” said Mark Strobel, Vice President of Marketing at Xcentric. “Our new, 13-day standard delivery time is a business solution that helps our clients meet their customers’ demand for a near-continuous flow of new products and enhanced features.”

By meeting this need, Xcentric is able to provide services that are even more customer focused. This is all part of the company’s desire to create lasting relationships with their clients and to let customers know that Xcentric is more than just aware of current customer needs – they’re doing something about it.

Xcentric actively works to continuously improve their production process. The reduced standard delivery time applies to the most common sizes of injection-molded components that are produced in one of more than 50 stock materials.

When speaking to clients about how this new decrease in shipping will positively affect their bottom line, Strobel said, “[It’s] 2 full days off our previous standard delivery times. That means you get 2 additional days to optimize your design, conduct what-if analysis, or squeeze in that last new part feature while still meeting your go-to-market targets.”

Additional shipping options allow customers to select even faster, expedited levels of shipping which can reduce shipping time to as few as five (5) business days. These expedited shipping options are based on the complexity of design and materials chosen. Xcentric Fast

Xcentric Mold & Engineering was founded in 1997 as a quick-turn plastic injection molding manufacturer. Since then, Xcentric has expanded its services to include CNC Machining, Rapid Prototyping, and 3D Printing. From Fortune 100 companies to start-ups throughout America, Xcentric creates parts for customers in a wide variety of industries such as healthcare, aerospace, automotive, and defense.

To learn more about Xcentric Mold & Engineering’s faster delivery time, or to speak with a team member about how this change can affect your business, contact us at 586-598-4636.

3 Types of Manufacturers: How To Choose

3 Types of Manufacturers: How To Choose

Dec 2, 2017 | Additive Manufacturing, Injection Molding, Molding, Rapid Manufacturing, Tips

Here are the Top 3 Types of Manufacturers and Tips for Choosing The Best Option

Choosing a competent vendor to help you produce your part is a critical step for the success of your project.  Let’s examine some of the different types of vendors currently available to source from.

Conventional Manufacturing

Conventional manufacturing is Unless your design is highly niched, extra large in size or requires more than 100,000 parts run at a time, conventional manufacturing, let’s face it, is just too damned slow. You are looking at a 6-12 week lead time, at minimum. And changes to your design or the tool will take even longer. In this faced paced economy where being first to market is the difference between winning and losing, you just can’t afford to go that route.

Overseas Manufacturing

You are probably thinking that China can produce your part faster and cheaper than conventional manufacturing. And you’d be right. But faster than 6-12 weeks isn’t saying much and cheaper goes both ways…pricing and quality.
Here are some more potential problems when working with a manufacturer overseas:

  • Hidden Fees– often times, shipping costs, duty and insurance are not included in a quote and will be added after the fact.
  • Reduced Quality– it’s been reported over the years that, among other problems, many Chinese manufacturers will reduce part quality to increase profit margins. One technique they might employ is to use a substandard material than the one you specified to save on their costs.
  • Delays– due to logistics and the distances for shipping, delivery can be unpredictable.
  • Copyright– the laws are very different abroad. There is little you can do to protect your design from being copycatted.

The bottom line is that you are really going to have to take the extra time to vet your overseas vendor to make sure you are getting what you are paying for. But we know your time is precious.
There is a third option.

Digital, On-Demand, Rapid Manufacturing

There are some companies right here in the US that specialize in true rapid manufacturing. A true rapid manufacturing company will be able to provide a quote very quickly, will have in-house production capabilities to ensure fast turn-around and be readily available for answering questions.
Some companies who claim to be a true rapid manufacturing company are simply brokers. They will take your order within the States and get their Chinese manufacturing partner to produce the mold and parts. No matter what they claim, this sacrifices speed.
Xcentric Mold & Engineering is a true rapid manufacturing company. Because we understand the custom nature of all projects, quotes that come through our 24 hour, online, interactive quote system are thoroughly reviewed by a highly trained engineer to determine the best possible way to manufacture it. The result is a quote that represents the best possible price for your part and delivered within mere hours. Combined with our on-site, state-of-the-art, fully-equipped manufacturing facility and along with our Advanced Mold Making System and Proprietary Process Engine, we are routinely able to produce some of the most complex parts that other suppliers will “no quote” or request design concessions.
We don’t find it acceptable to require that you change your design. After all, the features you put into that part were put there for a reason, right? It doesn’t make sense to us that you remove them. Instead, we’ll do everything possible to think “outside the box” to get the part that you designed manufactured as you designed it.
That is what makes Xcentric Mold & Engineering the best choice for manufacturing your project.
We can produce your prototypes and samples very quickly and accurately, but when production parts are your end game, understand that we’ve perfected the injection molding process to:

  • provide from the lowest to the highest of runs
  • serve the most economical of budgets
  • produce the most complex of designs
  • deliver the most immediate and urgent of projects

lifetime-mold-guaranteeAnd finally, with our Lifetime Mold Guarantee, we will guarantee your mold for life. That means there’s no quantitily limit for the life of your project.
With a onetime, upfront tooling fee, we guarantee that we will supply unlimited part quantities for the life of your project.
Start your project off right with the manufacturer who can produce more parts, faster, cheaper and more consistently than anyone else.

Designing for Manufacturability

Designing for Manufacturability

Oct 21, 2017 | Additive Manufacturing, Injection Molding, Molding, Rapid Manufacturing, Tips

Designing for Manufacturability

Some things to consider moving forward toward manufacturing is the time and effort put into designing your part for manufacturability. As your project makes its way through the progression of its development, your original model may need to be altered to fit the manufacturing process.
As we have shown, each process has different accuracy and resolution attributes. They also have inherent design limitations.
In other words, designing for one is different than designing for another. Therefore, the design considerations you need to make at the start of your project will impact the costs associated with production.

Additive Manufacturing

When designing a part destined to be additively manufactured, it is important to understand that some design features may need to be altered for production.
Some things to consider for designing for additive manufacturing…

  • Larger parts outside the space limitations of your chosen process can be broken up into smaller pieces and assembled later.
  • Avoiding sharp edges in your AM design can improve accuracy.
  • Be aware of overhang – geometric angles larger than 45 degrees will require supports which could limit the complexity.
  • Thicker walls and hollowed interiors can reduce print time (SLA parts will need drain holes incorporated on all hollowed-out features).

Subtractive Manufacturing

CNC machining is an option for prototypes as well. The benefits include being able to achieve tight tolerances and creating objects out of the exact production material needed, both metal and plastic. However, if production of more than 50 parts is required, it can become costly in both time and money.

  • You have a wide selection of engineered grade materials for more accurate strength, flexibility, chemical resistance or other critical characteristics
  • If outsourcing your CNC project, 5-axis capabilities are capable of producing more complex designs
  • Part features can be as thin as 0.020 in.
  • Internal Threads can be achieved.

Injection Molding

Injection Molding is usually the preferred method for producing production parts. And because injection molding is economical in as few as 50 parts, it could be wise to design directly for the injection molding process if a production run is already in the budget.
With that in mind, we’ve produced a helpful guide to help you learn a little more about what it takes to design a part for the injection molding process.
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Injection Molding Cost Analysis: Simple and Complex Parts

Injection Molding Cost Analysis: Simple and Complex Parts

Aug 11, 2017 | 3D Printing VS. Injection Molding, Additive Manufacturing, Injection Molding

Injection molding cost analysis is a critical exercise when choosing a manufacturing process. In fact, it’s one of the most important, especially for projects working with a tight budget.

To help you put it all into perspective, we did a cost analysis for you.
Below we have two part designs. One is what we consider to be fairly simple and the other is more complex.

We’ve quoted these two parts through the quoting engines of various rapid manufacturing companies, averaged them out and compared them to our own injection molding process. This will provide you a good idea of how piece pricing will effect overall costs among the most common manufacturing methods.

It will also provide a better sense of when to start thinking about injection molding process for your prototypes or production run. It might be a little earlier than you think.

Injection Molding Cost Analysis: Simple and Complex Parts.

Simple Part

SimplePart

  1 Unit 10 Units 25 Units 50 Units
Process Piece Total Piece Total Piece Total Piece Total
FDM $40.18 $40.18 $40.18 $401.80 $40.18 $1,004.50 $40.18 $2,009.00
SLA $67.62 $67.62 $50.34 $503.40 $49.19 $1,229.75 $48.80 $2,440.00
SLS $14.51 $14.51 $10.59 $105.90 $10.40 $260.00 $10.34 $517.00
IM na na na na $56.00 $1,400.00 $38.06 $1,902.75

Complex Part

ComplexPart

  1 Units 25 Units 50 Units 100 Units
Process Piece Total Piece Total Piece Total Piece Total
FDM $89.19 $89.19 $89.19 $2,229.75 $89.19 $4,459.50 $89.19 $8,919.00
SLA $95.88 $95.88 $77.09 $1,927.25 $76.70 $3,835.00 $76.70 $7,670.00
SLS $33.99 $33.99 $24.36 $609.00 $24.22 $1,211.00 $24.08 $2,408.00
IM na na $235.16 $5,879.00 $128.80 $6,440.00 $66.62 $6,662.00

The injection molding process has fewer limitations than any other method for manufacturing and is still the king of thermoplastic part production. Despite SLS being less expensive, it is very limited in material selection which makes it more suitable for prototyping than anything else. Injection molding is probably more economical than you thought.

The benefits of injection molding will allow you to select from a huge assortment of engineered grade thermoplastics, to choose many different types of surface finishes and can build some of the most complex designs. For simpler designs, the injection molding process becomes an even better choice if you need fewer than 50 pieces.