According to Aldo Balatti, senior product designer/plastic applications
specialist at DW Product Development, Inc., it would be very difficult to work
with plastic materials and not utilize Moldflow Plastic Insight (MPI) or
Moldflow Plastic Adviser (MPA). New product development now is in the age of
optimization. As a busy product design firm, we need to save as much material as
possible to reduce costs. We don't have the luxury of time to redesign or retool
because of unforeseen problems. Competitive products from Asia and other
countries are hurting North American manufacturers. Finite element analysis (FEA)
and mold filling analytical tools are essential just as mold makers are using
high speed machining to deliver tools at light speed. The Asian mold makers are
operating 24/7, which until lately has not been typical of North American mold
makers. Today, the average turnaround time for an Asian mold maker is eight
weeks. In North America, we are used to a 10 to 16 week turnaround time. Indeed,
high speed machining is reducing those cycle times.
The same point applies to CAE software products. These tools are absolutely
paramount in validating and getting products to market faster. Using products
such as MPA is part of our everyday life as designers and engineers. It's hard
to imagine being as productive as we are without them. As more companies
recognize the importance of using CAE software as part of the validation and
optimization process, they will become more competitive in a global marketplace.
It is definitely worth investing in the technology because the payoffs are
significant. We also acknowledge that rapid prototyping and rapid tooling is a
vital part of the validation process.
DW recently used MPA in the design of Motorola's new line of digital deskset
telephones as well as an appliance light diffuser for Electrolux. DW is one of
Moldflow's MPA beta sites. Aldo Balatti is a board member of the International
Moldflow user Group (iMUG), and was a presenter at the 2002 iMUG conference.
