- Do you have engineering design or physic samples? if you provide drawing, the most mold factories prefer 3D data in step or IGES format. If the design is complicated or large, the mold design should also be complicated and more cost. if you have physical samples, the mold factory will copy it and made the mold for you.
- What kind of plastic materials will you use for product? their price and characters are totally different when you choose different plastic resins.
- How many cavities will the injection mold have? how many parts will it make per shot(cycle)?it depends on the quantity you forcast to produce. if you plan to produce a huge quantity, then need more cavities in the mold.
- What mold life will it be? how many parts it can make during its lifetime. The higher class steel use for the mold, the mold life will be more longer, then more parts will be made. Cheaper steel or soft steel will cause shorter mold life.
- what is the tolerance of your plastic parts.if the tolerance is too tight,then the plastic injection mold price will be higher.because it bring more risk to adjust the dimensions.Normally the tolerance is +/_ 0.05mm for general plastic parts.
- Will the injection mold stay in China for production after manufacturing? if your quantity is not so high, it will save the shipping cost and import duty
- Will you own the injection mold? Or the mold factory? if the mold factory own the mold, they will quote the mold with non-profit price, but they want to get some profit from mass production
- If the mold factory will own the mold, How much will you need to pay when you get your mold from them? Normally the mold factory will charge 20% mold price for compensating. of course you can request 100% ownership of the mold, then you need to pay higher price at the beginning.
- Will the injection mold be made with American standard or Europe standard components? if they are made in china standard. it will take long time or high cost to wait for the mold components from china when they damage or wear out
- Do you need hot runner for your mold?Hot Runner Molds are usually more expensive.it affect plastic injection mold price a lot. But not all of molds should be hot runner. It depends on the structure of the part, the part size, the wall thickness, the required quantity, etc
- What is the finish of your plastic product? If transprent plastic material(such as PC,PMMA), the mold polishing should be with a higher level which leads to more cost. if need special texture on your product surface, then it will cause some cost, which depends on the texture spec. if need MT or Nihon standard,it will be much more expensive than normal requirement.
if you prepare all the information for above questions,Then you will easiy get the price of plastic injection mold from mold factory.