AIM Processing Small Plastic Parts Blog

There are many different common types of plastics used in the injection molding industry today. And for many projects, there will be numerous suitable plastics to choose from.

Of course, choosing the best thermoplastic material for your project isn’t simply a case of going with the strongest and most durable option, or choosing the cheapest suitable material. You have to carefully consider the use cases for your end products, all of the performance requirements, potential reliability issues that may arise, as well as the overall material cost, availability, and sustainability.

 

 

Plastic injection molding is sometimes compared to extrusion when customers are searching for the most optimized manufacturing method for their products. While the injection molding and extrusion processes are very different, they are both capable of producing high-quality parts with complex designs.

Nevertheless, there are certain types of products – or production goals – which are much better suited for the injection molding process, and vice versa. Learn more about these two unique manufacturing services below, including the common advantages and product applications.

While injection molding services are often compared or even cross-shopped with vacuum forming, which is a specialized form of thermoforming. However, the two manufacturing processes are actually quite different, and each is uniquely optimized for different types of projects.

If you’d like to learn more about how the injection molding process works, check out our Brief Introduction to Injection Molding as well as our Plastic Injection Molding Services page. Or if you’d like to delve deeper into the advantages of injection molding specifically compared to vacuum forming, check out our comparison of the two processes below.

Two of the most common plastic injection molding services used throughout the industry today are insert molding and overmolding. These specialized production processes are so closely related that sometimes customers use the names interchangeably. However, there are some key technical differences which set these two crucial injection molding capabilities apart.

For more than 50 years, the Colorado region has been a national hotspot for the injection molding industry. Throughout the decades, our state has served as one the nation’s primary bases in providing the custom toolmaking and injection molding services which are critical for manufacturing so many of today’s plastic products.

The demand for quality American injection molding services continues to rise in 2023, with an increasing number of domestic sellers onshoring some or all of their plastic manufacturing operations. Colorado is no exception, continuing to evolve into a nexus for the state-of-the-art plastic molding industry.

Of course, reshoring is partly a response to international supply chain disruptions which have impacted higher level manufactured products over the last several years. Many customers are simply looking for a more reliable manufacturing partner that offers a more dependable supply chain. However, it’s also largely an embrace of the superior quality, convenience, and customer service that Colorado’s injection molding companies can offer.

Automated production technology has become increasingly common throughout the American manufacturing sector – and the plastic injection molding service industry is no exception. New automation technology allows domestic manufacturers to be substantially more efficient and more productive, and thus more cost-competitive with their overseas counterparts.

Plastic injection molding services are a reliable, efficient, and scalable method for manufacturing an extremely wide range of different small parts and components. However, like all production methods, the injection molding process poses some unique challenges for small plastic part manufacturers.

In this article, we discuss some of the most common challenges and quality control issues that can arise with custom injection molded products. At AIM Processing, we apply decades of combined engineering expertise and utilize the latest production technology to overcome these challenges, delivering superior injection molded products which are manufactured to your exact specifications.

Small part injection molding is an efficient and economical manufacturing method used across many different industries and product categories.

When compared to traditional casting methods or 3D printing, plastic injection molding is quicker to set up and easier to scale. Furthermore, the injection molding process is highly automatable, making it ideal for today’s domestic customers in search of a more flexible and reliable supply chain solution.