Molding and Casting
Sources:
- Molding and casting on Neil Gershenfeld's website
- How to make a mold using SLA printers (Formlabs)
- Guide to Manufacturing Processes for Plastics (Formlabs)
- Molding and Casting Tutorial (How to Make Almost Anything)
Techniques
- injection mold (video )
- Thermoforming
- insert, overmolding (video)
- vacuum (video)
- blow mold (video, video)
- rotational, centrifugal (video)
- vacuum, pressure assisted
- die, investment casting (video)
- flexible, soft, short-run production (video, video)
Vendors
Materials
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Machineable wax: for prototyping, lost wax casting, dental CAD/CAM, jewelry manufacture and more.
-
Gesso, epoxy, shrink wrap, hot air
-
Thermoplastic, Thermoset polymers: Plastics are the most common materials for producing end-use parts and products, for everything from consumer products to medical devices. Plastics are a versatile category of materials, with thousands of polymer options, each with their own specific mechanical properties.
- Thermoplastics:
- Acrylic (PMMA)
- Acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS)
- Polyamide (PA)
- Polylactic acid (PLA)
- Polycarbonate (PC)
- Polyether ether ketone (PEEK)
- Polyethylene (PE)
- Polypropylene (PP)
- Polyvinyl chloride (PVC)
- Thermosets:
- Cyanate ester
- Epoxy
- Polyester
- Polyurethane
- Silicone
- Vulcanized rubber
- Thermoplastics:
-
Calcium sulfate
- Desicant, coagulant, plaster, gypsum, drywall
- Drystone
-
Portland cement
- calcium silicate, aluminum/iron oxide, calcium sulfate
- Hydro-Stone
Processing
- workspace
- testing
- mixing
- water capacity
- weight vs volume
- consistency
- striations
- time
work
demold
filling
pouring
starting
vent location
submerging
bubbles
stirring, pouring, vibrating, painting, vacuum, pressure, time
curing
polymerization
cross-linking
hydration
endothermic
exothermic
demolding
draft angle
release agents
dilute dish soap, vaseline, talc, ...
deformation
storage
shelf life
Software
-
Fusion 360