Much like raising a child, inspecting a new part doesn’t always come with an instruction manual. Luckily, there are reference guides to help you with both. In the world of thermoforming, we refer to 3D CAD files and part drawings to get us through to final inspection.
3D CAD files are perfect for getting up close and personal with part dimensions. The ability to virtually rotate a part to see every angle and dimension is especially helpful when determining the best way to lay out a mold, configure a trim path and ensure the part produced meets the customer’s expectations. When drawings aren’t available or are lacking detail, we can refer to the CAD to get the inspection dimensions we need.
There are many instances where our customers don’t have CAD files, but are able to supply drawings. Some drawings are extremely detailed, listing material specifications, critical inspection dimensions, tolerances and packaging requirements. Other drawings may only have rough dimensions. When dealing with the latter, we try to gather some of the below information:
Although sometimes difficult, when we have the necessary information, we can see this part through from infancy to end use.