| Ford has invested in MCP’s new nylon casting technology at its European rapid prototyping centre in Dunton, Essex in the UK.
MCP's new nylon casting vacuum caster |
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Centre manager, Richard Wooldridge, says: “My team intend to use the technology to produce nylon prototype parts for a number of projects. We see the nylon casting module as a cost-effective alternative to injection moulding short runs of nylon prototypes – considering the time and cost implications associated with the production of aluminium tooling.”
The nylon casting module, which can be supplied as a factory-fitted option to MCP’s latest 5/04 vacuum caster, is one of MCP’s newest technologies. Because it enables nylon parts to be produced in a matter of days, it offers significant benefits to the automotive industry for the production of prototypes such as live hinges, air inlet manifolds, trims, brackets and electrical housings. Parts manufactured via this new patented method are heat and ultrasonically weldable, enabling the production of multi-part assemblies in the prototyping or pre-production stage without the need for fixings.
Unlike other processes which produce porous nylon prototypes, MCP’s nylon casting system produces fully dense parts in Nylon 6, including those with complex geometries and thin wall sections. Cycle times are as little as six minutes which is much faster than standard MCP vacuum casting of polyurethane.
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