Molding design is an important part of large-scale new product development process. Since product and molding design are interdependent, understanding new product development process of plastic parts, molding design process, and role of mold manufacturing process is very useful to product design engineers and molding design engineers. Typical stages of new product development process include product definition, product design, experience and product development, capacity enhancement, and market launch.
Although new product development process is complex, it most have following two key attributes:
(1) Establish a systematic development plan to ensure integrity of design and manufacturing.
(2) Establish a level process to avoid risks by making an effective assessment of budget at key points of project.
(3) New product development process is divided into multiple stages by approving expense level. Previous phase will be assessed in next phase.

 

New product development process begins with an analysis of market, an understanding of competitor product standards, a definition of product specifications, and an assessment of potential earnings. If management agrees to develop new products, it will form a suitable team for early conceptual design and business development. In the first phase, it is necessary to estimate profitability of product. Market research will try to predict potential sales at different price points in the early stages of product development. At the same time, a budget for development of products, cost of labor and project costs required to bring products to market will be established. By continuously assessing likely success of product development business success, management's evaluation of concept design, anchor sales expectations and budget is obtained. Proposed product development project may be rejected, put on hold or modified accordingly.

If project is approved and budget is allocated, then new product development process will continue. It will usually be further analyzed and designed after additional funding is provided. In second phase, each component in product is detailed in design. Design of plastic parts includes considerations such as aesthetics, structure, heat, and manufacturing. Design of manufacturing method will be used to confirm problem of efficient manufacturing of part. Assembly method is designed to reduce parts, determine critical dimension tolerances and ensure assembly economics of finished product.
Design results of initial product design phase (through second management recommendation) are a detailed and validated product design. “Detailed design” means that each part is assigned material, geometry, surface roughness, tolerances, supplier and cost. If you need to customize plastic parts, you need to quote them at this stage. For approval, manufacturing costs and detailed design are submitted to management. If product design and cost are acceptable, then required budget is allocated and product development is focused on manufacturing.

 

While molding design and mold making are focus of plastics industry, they are all included in “Mold Making” campaign. At the same time, important business development and production planning will be carried out. Specifically, business development requires a complete definition of supply chain and creation of an initial order to support launch of product. Production planning is required to lay out assembly line, assign human resource requirements, and establish manufacturing technology facilities.
When mold is completed, “α” initial product production, testing and assembly work will be carried out. Initial product is then subjected to a series of tests to verify its performance levels, execution standards and user satisfaction. If initial product is not satisfactory, manufacturing process, related tools and detailed component design should be appropriately adjusted. At the same time, operator will plan in detail for quality control and training of personnel.

Use management review methods to verify that design and production plan of developed product is clear. If so, a medium number of weights can be made in sample manufacturing process according to standard manufacturing requirements. “β” products produced will provide marketing, sales and major customers to determine acceptability of product. As before, products designed and manufactured may be modified to address important issues. When all stakeholders (marketing, sales, manufacturing, key suppliers, important customers) are ready, products are produced on the basis of sample production process and initial inventory of products is established, and then products are placed on the market.

 

Mold quotation, molding design and mould manufacturing support a large new product development process. When it is necessary to provide a quotation for mold and or part costs, it usually means start of conceptual design phase or beginning of detailed design phase. At this time, if mold engineer or mold maker gives a sufficiently detailed design, it is somewhat unreasonable because:
(1) A lot of work in early molding design is carried out simultaneously with imperfect product design;
(2) Molding design may require major modifications due to manufacturing process or product performance considerations.
Mold development process usually begins with an initial design that lacks detail. If initial design is used directly, it may result in an unsatisfactory product. Design information for critical parts required for initial molding design includes part size, thickness, and expected throughput. Based on this information, mold designers can develop initial mold layouts, give cost estimates, and give product design improvements. In order to speed up product development process, molding design and mold parts procurement and customization can be carried out simultaneously.
When product development phase is coming to an end, mold making and commissioning phase begins. For this reason, mold maker and suppliers are under great pressure to provide high quality molds as quickly as possible. This task is very challenging because of potential errors in design process of product. As a result, mold designers may be required to redesign, modify portions of mold, work with mold manufacturer to determine if mold meets production requirements.