the challenge of labor

One of the top challenges facing the toolmaking industry is labor. As COVID-19 proved how fragile the international supply chain is, we currently see the highest percentage of OEMs reshoring manufacturing in 18 years¹. This reshoring has increased plastic processors’ demand, as plastic processors’ sales see year after year growth, with sales rising by an average of 15% per year since 2020¹.

To meet the increase in demand for molded parts comes with an increase in demand for tooling. Tooling lead times have increased significantly with this demand, with 57% of processors reporting an increase in domestic tooling lead times and 41% reporting an increase for foreign tooling between 2020 – 2022¹. Perhaps even more concerning is that 80% of these processors report increased tooling costs for domestic providers and a 53% increase for foreign providers.

When demand for a product increases and the product’s lead time and costs also increase, it implies a shortage in supply.
Since the 1980s, much of the toolmaking in the US moved to Asia. The low labor and raw materials cost made toolmaking overseas appealing compared to producing domestically. As tooling moved overseas, the number of tool shops in the US declined. Unsurprisingly, as the number of tool shops in the US decreased, so did the number of toolmakers and the number of people going into toolmaking. The number of toolmakers in the US has decreased by over 50% over the last 25 years.²

¹Manufacturers Association for Plastics Processors 2023 State of the Plastics Industry Report

²US Bureau of Labor Statistics, all employees, thousands, special die and tool, die set, jig, and fixture manufacturing, not seasonally adjusted

robotics for automation

One solution to addressing labor challenges in toolmaking is investing in new technologies for automation. Three examples of technologies that toolmakers are adopting include pick-and-place robotics systems, simulation products, and metal 3D printers.

Pick-and-place robotics systems have become far more accessible thanks to companies like Rapid Robotics, which have significantly lowered the barrier to entry. These robots can be used to automate parts of the toolmaking process, for example, an EDM cell that automatically swaps sinker EDM electrodes, allowing the machine to run lights out without needing a user to change the electrodes manually.

example:

Westminster Tool, a precision toolmaker located in Plainfield, CT, has palletized their sinker EDM electrodes and incorporated robotics to swap the electrodes during burning. This allows their EDM cell to run lights out with minimal user interaction.

Another option is to palletize your workpieces, automatically allowing robotics to move pieces from machine to machine. These systems allow you to eliminate the impact of part setup time and reduce your non-value-added costs by providing a constant flow of parts to the machines, keeping them running. Additionally, palletization improves tolerances and part consistency since tools aren’t being refixtured when moved between machines. While setup can be expensive and requires highly skilled labor, palletization combined with robotics can dramatically increase shop and machine efficiency.

Job shop simulation

To ensure you optimize the labor you do have, simulation products help you understand how tools move through your shop, allowing you to identify backups before they happen. For example, Plant Simulation from Siemens is a discrete event simulation software that models and simulates a digital twin of your shop floor—including robots, automation, material handling systems, and people—to improve the performance of your shop floor. Once the digital twin is created, experiments can be run to see the results of different equipment and labor distributions.

3d printed tooling

Metal 3D printing can automate up to 95% of a tool build with minimal user interaction. For example, Mantle’s metal 3D printing technology prints H13 tool inserts that are close to final after printing. Depending on the surface finish and tolerance required, printed inserts only require grinding to fit into the mold base and finish the ejector pin holes. This small amount of finishing is enabled thanks to the Mantle’s ability to print parts with a D2 surface finish comparable to sinker EDM and tolerances of ± 0.001” per in.

Since the printer requires no user interaction during printing and only an hour to set up, it reduces the amount of labor required to build a tool, allowing your toolmakers to focus on other critical tasks and increase shop throughput.

example:

Nicolet Plastics used Mantle’s metal 3D printing technology to print 3 complex inserts, requiring only a few hours of user interaction to print the part. Thanks to printing, Nicolet could remove all sinker EDM work that would have been required. The result was a decrease in calendar lead time from 6 weeks to 2 weeks and a reduction of toolmaking hands-on operations of 170 hours; only 10 hours of hands-on toolmaking time was required with the Mantle printed insert.

conclusion

The plastic industry faces an unprecedented labor crunch exacerbated by a fragile international supply chain and rapidly growing domestic demand. With reshoring on the rise, the issue of tooling lead times and costs has reached a critical point. Innovative technologies such as metal 3D printing, robotics, and simulation software offer promising solutions. These technologies can significantly reduce the labor required during the toolmaking process, allowing for shorter lead times and lower costs. Shops embracing these technologies are solving labor shortages and ensuring longevity as labor scarcity continues.