Editor’s Note: Recently, Glenn Starkey, president of Progressive Components (a TPN Sponsor) happened upon the 1993 inaugural issue of Injection Molding Magazine and read through the issue to see what might be still timely in today’s global market, and what might not.  He found Bill Tobin's article entitled “Can You Live Without the Tooling Engineer?” and thought it would not only be pertinent today, but back in ‘93, if taken to heart, might have helped some companies later in the tumultuous ‘00/’01 period.  Rather than selling this copy on eBay for millions and millions of dollars, he presented the issue to Bill at NPE 2006 and also passed it forward to the TPN.  So we now present it to you, our readers, as this month’s Guest Speaker column.

Can You Live Without

the Tooling Engineer?

 By William J. Tobin 

There is a classic song in the musical Music Man called "You Gotta Know the Territory.” It describes success as knowing the customers, the marketplace, and how to sell it. 

The current corporate vogue is to downsize. Many managers look at the product creation cycle and see the designers as necessary because they create the product. The manufacturing engineers and quality engineers are necessary because they assure the flow of product. The purchasing function is also essential because it procures the plastic parts to make the product. So who gets downsized? The tooling engineer. His (or her) function is usually deemed to be redundant and the duties that this job accomplishes can be split up into the design, quality, and purchasing functions. 

As a molder, or the person who runs the captive operation, you now have to train your customer—external or internal—all over again to assure business will go on successfully. 

Is anyone cross-checking the product design and critiquing it for manufacturability before it goes out for quotations? On your next visit to the customer, offer to give a quick half-hour free consultation on new designs. You don’t have to mention you want to be on the bid list, or are trying to make your job easier. Do the design engineers use SPI’s Standards and Practices of Plastics Molder, for part tolerancing or do they simply use the tolerance they used on the last print? Are they aware of the SPI mold finish standards or the SPI mold classification standards? Most designers don’t even know these publications exist. They are of valuable assistance, showing what tolerance a material can hold, how to specify a mold., and how to specify a part finish. Buy a couple of sets of these books and leave than with the buyer to handout to the designers. 

If you’re a custom molder, at Christmas, instead of buying 50 Currier & Ives calendars, put together a package for each of your customers: write or buy a set of tooling standards. Put together an ideal quoting farm so when the next set of quotes goes out you won’t see phrases like “Class A tool,”, “P-20 or equivalent,” or “the finish shale be a high polish.” There is no such thing as a Class A tool unless it’s part of your company tooling standards. If there were an equivalent to P-20 it would be called P-20. The concept of “high polish” can be any one of six steel finishes. The object here is to create a level playing field so that your quote will be on the same basis as other vendors. 

Look at your quality manual: make sure you have a section on mold maintenance—routine refurbishment and major replacement maintenance. Put in a section on tool qualifications—functional part acceptance / qualification, dimension qualification, and / or statistical qualification. Add a second on the process of building the mold— specifically on how to handle and account for authorized an unauthorized engineering changes. Once you’ve gotten all this together, make copies for all your customers. Let other vendors hand out the calendars. Your customers will be using your quality manual and the SPI standards with your company’s or division’s “compliments of…” sticker on it to write the specifications for the next job. 

It has been said that one secret to success is to do a lot of favors for people without the prospect of a return.  If you provide your customers with the information mentioned here you will be seen as the molding expert who is a true professional and knows what needs to be done to put a product into the market.  In short, you’ll be the right one for the next job. 

William J. (Bill) Tobin of WJT Assoc. (bill4012@hotmail.com) provides full-service consulting to the plastics industry and publishes a monthly newsletter on molding tips. Contact him if you wish to subscribe or visit www.wjtassociates.com.

Be a TPN Guest Speaker!  If you'd like to submit an article for a future issue of the TPN, please contact Editor Cyndi Kustush at editor@tooling-product-news.com for editorial guidelines. Be sure to provide complete contact information and any proposed topics or ideas.