A high quality injection mold is the cornerstone of a successful IML project. There're many excellent thin-wall container mold makers in China and Chinese mould is famous for its fast delivery with competitive price, but many buyers had very bed experience while purchasing a mould from China. Why and how to have avoid pitfalls in your purchasing of a Chinese thin-wall container mold for your IML project?

A quality injection mould for thin-wall containers IML production will have a guarantee of 4 million shots at a very high speed say 5s/injection cycle with the perfect consistency of the parts produced. The quality of a thin-wall container mould would be decided by the thickness of the parts, the choose of the mold steel, the mould parts, the mold structure design, the hot runner and the valve gate etc.

• The Thickness of the Parts:

  A thin-wall container means that the thinckness of the parts would be <1mm; In China the thickness of an IML Yogurt Cup would be around 0.5~0.6mm and most of the experienced mould makers of thin-wall containers will be able to do it. But for a thinner container mold making it would be a challenge to most of the mold makers from China, especially the low budget mould.

• The Choose of the Mould Steel:

  For thin-wall containers mold making, have mold steel #2344 (HRC46-48) for the mold core & cavity and P20 for mold base is an economic option. It'll guarantee the mold life for a medium quantity thin-wall containers IML production.

• The Mold Parts:

  It's no doubt that the quality of the mold would be superb with the standard parts from the big names such as Hasco, DME etc., but for any IML project we'll have to consider the budget and how fast we'll have our investment back. To reduce the cost of of the mold most of the mold makers in China will provide a solutions of tooling with Hasco/DME compatible mold parts.

• The Hot-runner and Gates:

  For IML project with sufficient budget, a mould with Mold-Masters/Husky/DME hot runners would be the top choice with excellent mold flow balance and easy maintenance, but for most IML project the cost of a mold with these hot runners would be out of the budget. Yudo hot runner would be an economic solution of high quality thin-wall mold making, and many mold makers in China now has their own brand hot runner which OEM produced by the OEM producers of the big names with a compatible quality.

• The Mold Structure Design:

  The cycle time of your IML system will decice the profitability of your IML project. An excellent chilling system design will help to reduce the injection cycle and a bad chilling would be a disaster to the IML project. I had a terrible experience in 2019, one of my clients bought a 4 cavities 500ml containers mold at the cost around $7500, a real bargain right? After the trial starting it turned to be a nightmare, we found that there's no chilling water pass through the core and the parts wast too hot to be ejected.

I think for most of the first time visitors of Chinaplas who want to buy a mold would be very excited because there're so many makers of thin-wall containers and if you're keep bargaining from the first booth to the end it's possible the get 90% of the first quotation off. What I propose here is that a mold for thin-wall container is a little bit different from the others, a professional mold making company specialized in the thin-wall containers mold making only will guarantee the quality of the mold and reliable after service.

It's a good ideal to have the mold tested with the IML robot according to the parameter of the system design which will help to find out all the defects of the machineries in the system. It's easy to resolve any problem when it's still in China with the powerful supply chain, but would be very difficult after delivery.

Any way, a turn-key solutions of IML will help you to reduce the purchasing risk of the mold for your IML project, with the first IML robot delivered in 2009, SWITEK has sound cooperation with the professional thin-wall containers mold making companies in China and will provide you with a price smart ready to work IML solution.