China Dispatch: Adventures in Case Manufacturing

Plastic Injection Process

Since most cases feature at least some plastic parts, plastic injection is required to produce these parts. Like the hard tooling dies, the plastic injection molds require a significant financial investment from Chenbro. The basic concept of the plastic injection process is simple: you take plastic and melt it to a liquid form, then inject it into a preformed mold to produce plastic parts; when the mold cools you have a solid plastic part. This process is used for everything that is plastic on the case, from the drive rail holder to the front bezel.

The ABS plastic resin is poured into the machine in the form of pellets. These pellets are then melted down and injected into the molds to form the parts.

As with the sheet metal, a mold shop is also required to maintain and create the molds for the plastic injection process. Here we see modification and maintenance to one of the molds. As with the metal stamping dies, the plastic injection molds are equally cost intensive.

As with the sheet metal shop, many racks are required to hold the plastic injection molds.