Company Tours

Irvine, CA—When Scott Rose described the application's geometries as "challenging", Spencer Cook could only shake his head and laugh. "Definitely," Cook reiterated. "Anti-molding 101," added Jose Ramirez. "Negative to zero draft, and if you operate in the stable part of the viscosity curve, 90% of the time, you would not make an acceptable part."

Construction activity seems to be everywhere at Built-Rite Tool & Die and  two sister companies in Lancaster, MA as they seeks to boost medical business and expand specialties in compression/transfer molding, insert molding, liquid injection molding, and mold making.

When Robert Gattshall, process engineer at Tech Group Michigan, ran the numbers, he realized his technicians didn't have a chance. The sheer number of data points they entered daily meant that even the most meticulous machine operator was destined for input errors—input errors that could jeopardize an entire shift's work.

In one hand, Rick Fitzpatrick holds a pile of plastic pellets, in the other, a finished part. "How much energy do we need to convert this," he says, raising the hand with the pellets, "into that," he finishes, lifting the part. That essential question should be the only one injection molding technology answers, but to Fitzpatrick, many of the accepted material, machinery, and design norms taken as a given in injection molding, are old paradigms.

The last two decades have been a roller coaster ride for many molding companies and their employees. But for three long-time plastics industry management people, the lessons learned have been incorporated into their injection molding business, which started out small but has seen good growth and expansion.  Three partners, all vice presidents, are Rod Bricker, Gerry Phillips and Jerry Williams. The trio started Prism Plastics LLC.

Below a snapshot of the week that was at PlasticsToday (11/28-12/2), with a few tasty tidbits picked from the smorgasbord of plastics we served up over the last five days.

With the increasing demand for molding liquid silicone rubber (LSR), GW Plastics Inc., a custom contract molder/manufacturer headquartered in Bethel, VT, announced a $3 million dollar investment in a new facility to house its LSR operations. Ground-breaking for the new facility will be in Royalton, VT, in October, with plans for full occupancy of the facility by the first quarter of 2012.

One way to reduce the energy, space, and maintenance impact of dryers in the extrusion of materials like polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and polylactic acid (PLA) is to eliminate the need for them altogether. That's the promise of the "dryer-less" twin-screw sheet extrusion technology that Processing Technologies International (PTi; Aurora, IL) showcased during a Sept. 20 open house at its company headquarters in Aurora, IL.

With a few years of experience with our successful webinars and the success last week of our inaugural virtual event, we don't need convincing that a Virtual Event can be just as instructive, and a lot more convenient, than traveling somewhere. For plastics processors who may have missed its open house in May, plastics processing machinery manufacturer Milacron has made the event "available" as part of an online presentation.

"Focused factories" accommodate growth and keep Hoffer on the cutting edge in the packaging industry as the third generation of Hoffer's leads the way.