Costs reduced by 40 percent Moulder maximises productivity with E-Multi auxiliary equipment

Mold-Masters’ E-Multi auxiliary equipment provides Easy Plast with the capability to maximize productivity. Critical component to the success of this application is its precise shot weight and repeatability, the customer reports.

Easy Plast, a European based company, has been manufacturing moulds and molding plastics since 1994. It specialises in multi-cavity moulds for consumer products and in moulding parts in PP, LDPE, HDPE, and LLDPE. Available components include caps, capsules, dispensers, ferrules, medical, houseware, packaging and more. The company manufactures over a billion molded items every year. Easy Plast creates high-quality products for national and international markets.

The manufacturer was producing a complex Carton style closure (HDPE 3-component screw cap, 2 -colour). The current process involved moulding each component in three separate cells with three separate moulds. This specific closure design incorporates a cutter element that opens the aluminum seal once the closure is opened by the consumer.

As part of this process, from the mould(s) they are removed by robot to an assembly jig where the caps are finally ejected fully assembled.

Easy Plast was hoping to improve the manufacturing process to improve overall productivity and efficiency to lower part cost by:

• minimise equipment utilisation and manpower

• improving part quality

• Reducing cycle time (and handling)

• saving floor space

Easy Plast had developed a unique 24+24+24 triple stack family mold and ultimately patented the technology. As a component of this solution an E-Multi (EM4) auxiliary injection unit and controller was utilised to inject the component with the 2nd colour.

The E-multi unit was mounted in a horizontal configuration almost parallel to the press (15° angle) utilising a floor stand. The E-Multi unit was selected for its precision injection capabilities, repeatability, reliability and shot capacity.

The customer estimates that the time to complete the injection and assembly process has been reduced by about 50 percent as a result of this new system. The shrinkage occurs to all three parts evenly after assembly leading to extremely high tolerances and excellent part quality. As a result of minimising the handling requirements after moulding, the scrap rate has been reduced by up to 75 percent (was two percent, now 0.5-1 percent). Overall, the customer reports that this new process has enabled him to lower part costs by about 40 percent and predicts annual savings of at least 100,000 euros. The customer attributes these savings to the more efficient process (enabled by the E-Multi and special mould design) which requires one less person, two less moulding machines, less cooling equipment, lower production times, lower assembly times, lower scrap rate and lower energy consumption.

In addition, Easy Plast expects to be able to further improve cycle times as the E-Multi has not been utilised to its full performance limit (it is not the bottleneck in the production process).

The customer was very happy with the unit. It is working extremely well and there are plans to order another one for a future similar project. The controller is also favoured for its interface, ease of use and installation.

(ID:48418489)