Our platform engineering manager RJ Hawkins explains that it’s typically best to involve foundries in your tooling design and go from there. This usually makes it much easier for foundries to help you optimize the design and process later. “Rely on the experts to get you there,” RJ said. It’s important to trust the experts from start to finish because they have a deep understanding of how various factors will work together to produce a quality casting.
The foundry business is not what it used to be 20 years ago. The employees that are out on the floor doing the labor typically have far less experience than ever before, sometimes after only training for a few months. This is one of the key factors that play into the importance of casting standardization. “Due to the skill sets and the craftsmanship and the artistry in some cases of some of those tenured employees, we could do a lot more with a lot less…” RJ explained. There is a high demand for newer and more advanced design tooling, more optimized tooling, and less complex tooling, even for more complex parts, because of the lack of experience in mist foundries today.
Overall, standardizing the casting process saves the customer time and money because there is less room for error. There is also no risk of the foundry having to redesign much of the tooling to fit the process, or simply not being able to make a casting with the tooling at all because it wouldn’t work for that facility. We want to provide our customers with the most efficient way of getting their products, and involving us in the design process is a large part.
Here at the Lawton Standard, we have six different locations that can help you along the process of creating your tooling and castings. Visit our website to find out more! We are always here to answer any questions you may have.