How many molds?

[Spruslayer]

With the newly tooled kits and parts coming out recently, how many copies of the mold of a subject are made to fill the demand for the product,or how many kits of one model can  be produced per day if there was only one mold?

Being im still waiting on my Grumpy Jenkins kit that i  preordered is what got me wondering.

Edited October 11, 2020 by Spruslayer

[Mark]

In all but a rare few exceptions, there is only one mold/tool for each kit.  With more modern kits, they are often designed from the start to produce two or more versions, by switching in different portions of the tool.  Stock and street machine or racing versions, for example.

[Greg Myers]

How long does it take from joining the mold halves together , injecting the plastic, separating, cooling, to make one kit ? 

[Mark]

I've heard the cycle takes about one minute, but I'd bet "offshore" manufacturing might move a bit quicker.

[Greg Myers]

That, with packaging, it's really amazing how they can knock out so many kits, 50,000.

[Spruslayer]

Thanks for the response guys.At 1 per minute if all gose well,five 8 hour shifts will produce about 2400 kits. With really popular kits with world wide distribution i can see where that may not be enough

[Fat Brian]

1 hour ago, Spruslayer said:

Thanks for the response guys.At 1 per minute if all gose well,five 8 hour shifts will produce about 2400 kits. With really popular kits with world wide distribution i can see where that may not be enough

If I remember correctly those in the know have posted that most kit runs are around 5,000 units these days, maybe 10k if they think they've got a hot seller coming out.

[Spruslayer]

13 minutes ago, Fat Brian said:

If I remember correctly those in the know have posted that most kit runs are around 5,000 units these days, maybe 10k if they think they've got a hot seller coming out.

In my case of waiting for  the Grumpy Vega,to me producing that number of kits should fill the demand as i dont think as popular as the Grumpy vega is, its not world wide known like say Godzilla 

[niteowl7710]

It's a lot easier to produce more kits when something sells out than it is to move a bunch of dead stock and sell it for below wholesale to Ollie's.

Manufacturing and production is the quick bit, it still then has to be containerized, take a long Pacific vacation by boat, and then ride a train up to Chicago and a truck to South Bend. Then get offloaded, inventoried, broken down, repacked and the shipped to the vendor your pre-order is purchased from...

Edited October 13, 2020 by niteowl7710

[1930fordpickup]

14 hours ago, Mark said:

I've heard the cycle takes about one minute, but I'd bet "offshore" manufacturing might move a bit quicker.

They can run them as fast as they want, but you get get warped bodies and hoods. 

[Mark]

2 hours ago, 1930fordpickup said:

They can run them as fast as they want, but you get get warped bodies and hoods. 

And, on occasion, that's what happens...

[SSNJim]

How long do they run the molds a day? For the aforementioned five shifts, would they run the machines continuously for 40 hours or periodically over 5 8 hour days? I guess I'm asking about heating and cooling times, and cool plastic between the plastic supply and the molds. 

[Fat Brian]

1 hour ago, SSNJim said:

How long do they run the molds a day? For the aforementioned five shifts, would they run the machines continuously for 40 hours or periodically over 5 8 hour days? I guess I'm asking about heating and cooling times, and cool plastic between the plastic supply and the molds. 

This is an interesting question, my dad worked in printing and worked twelve hour days because setting up the press with ink and plates and blankets and getting all four roller sets in register could take and hour or two and cleanup was at least an hour. Once you get the thing running right it's best to just let it go as long as possible.

[Mark]

I'd bet those factories work in shifts, 24/7/365.

[Tom Geiger]

12 minutes ago, Mark said:

I'd bet those factories work in shifts, 24/7/365.

In China that’s only two workers!

[SSNJim]

21 hours ago, Fat Brian said:

Once you get the thing running right it's best to just let it go as long as possible.

That's what I was thinking. Thanks!

[1930fordpickup]

Plastic plants run 24 7 365 days.  Rarely do they shut down because it can take a shift to get them running again.