Being a product designer is great. You go through requirements and then brainstorm to develop a product that does the job perfectly. Whether you do it for a company or you are working on your own project, product designing has its own challenges.
One of the biggest challenges in this field is developing the first prototype of your product through prototyping CNC machining service. All of your work and design is worthless if the product can’t be developed.
So what should you do if your product can’t be developed? Is the designer’s fault that it designs a product that cannot be developed or it’s a machining service provider’s fault that they cannot machine certain designs?
In this article, we will tell you all about getting your first prototyping CNC machining service in China and what you need to consider while getting your CNC machining service from any Chinese company.
Getting Your First Prototyping CNC Machining Service
Let’s take a real-life example of part of what was initially declined by a machining service provider for having features that cannot be machined.
The product designer of a company gets some requirements from a client about the product. The product is going to be a part of a sports car and needs to be designed with perfection.
Designer brainstorms for days to come up with several concept designs. Then after several considerations, the designer designs a product that does the job perfectly.
The product design is presented below. It is a symmetrical design where the left and right sides of the product are identical. There is a cavity or deep groove that divides the product in two parts. The inner side of that cavity or deep groove has some cuts with circular cross-sections.
The product was presented to the prototype CNC machining service provider and all final product requirements like dimensions, precision, surface finish, material, and budget were discussed. The CNC machining service providers inform product designers that your product cannot be developed as it has features that they cannot machine.
Reason Why Prototype CNC Machining Service Was Declined?
In a world where nothing is impossible to manufacture, the reason why your prototype CNC machining service declined is the budget. Each product has its own value and every project has a defined budget. If the machining of the product goes way more than the project budget or the maximum budget you offer is much less than what is actually cost to machine the product, then it will decline.
Why does the product machining cost exceed the budget?
There are several factors that define the machining cost of the product. These factors include but are not limited to
1. Design of Product
2. Material
3. Precision Required
4. Surface Finish Required
Design of Product
The design of the product will define the type of machines, type of tools, and how many machining processes will be needed to manufacture or to machine that specific design. This has a direct effect on the machining cost of the product.
A product that can be machined on a single machine or need a single machining process, will cost much less than a product that needs to be machined on different machines or need different processes on a single machine to get the final shape.
Material to be Machined
The material from which the product will be manufactured also has a direct impact on the machining cost of the product. As there are some materials that are very easy to machine and do not require any special tools.
Then there are materials that are very hard and very difficult to machine. These materials need special dedicated tools and sometimes dedicated processes that increase the cost of machining.
Although material selection is mostly influenced by the working requirement of a machine or product, there are certain materials that are a bit easy to machine but provide the exact same mechanical and material properties of a hard material. So a designer should prefer a material that is easy to machine so that machining costs can be reduced.
For example, Aluminum Alloy gives very high strength that is near the strength of steel but aluminum alloy is much easier to machine as compared to steel.
Precision Required
It depends a lot on the value of the project but the precision machining does impact the cost of machining. There are products that require very high precision machining and thus their machining cost will be much higher than the product that doesn’t require precision in machining.
Precision machining, when combined with the above two factors of design of the product and material to be machined, impacts much more than the regular concept of precision machining. The design that is difficult to machine and material that is very hard and needs much more than regular machining will add extra cost when doing precision machining.
Surface Finish Required
Similar to precision machining, the surface finish required by the final product also has a huge impact on the machining cost. As surface finish may require some dedicated machining and thus it will increase the cost of machining
Similar to precision machining, the surface finish when combined with difficult to be machined design and hard material will impact much more than a regular surface finish operation.
How to Successfully Deliver Prototype CNC Machining Service?
There are certain things that product designers and CNC machining service providers need to do or adopt in order to successfully provide prototype CNC machining services. For a successful delivery of prototype CNC machining service following things must be considered.
1. Design for Manufacturing
2. Versatility of Machining Facility
Design for Manufacturing
As far as the product designer’s work is concerned, it’s the designer’s responsibility to develop a design that is easy to manufacture. This concept is called design for manufacturing DFM.
Design for manufacturing means that a product designer designs a product by keeping in mind the manufacturing processes that will be needed to manufacture that specific design. In this manner the final design of the product will not have any features that cannot be processed at the current machining facility or at least can be machines with some dedicated tools for processes for combining several machining processes.
For cost-effective machining of a product it is advised to design the product in a manner that it can be machined completely on a single machine without the requirement of any dedicated tools or at least can be machined in a single machining facility.
Versatility of Machining Facility
It’s not always the designer’s mistake that a prototype CNC machining service cannot be delivered. It also depends a lot on the machining facility. Machining facility doesn’t have machines that can process multiple shapes or can machine hard material, then that facility cannot deliver good prototype CNC machining services.
In this regard, a CNC machining service provider should have the following machines.
1. Multi-axis CNC Machining Center
2. Multi-axis CNC Turning Center
3. CNC Wire Cut Electric Discharge Machine
4. CNC Die Sinking Electric Discharge Machine
5. Precision Grinders
Note: A machining service provider must have a very wide range of tools available so it can deliver a diverse machining service.
A multi-axis CNC turning or machining center is a group of machines that have multiple axes of rotation of tools and workpieces. A three-axis CNC machining center is a machine that has a maximum of three axis of movement to its tools and workpiece combined.
Similarly, a five-axis CNC machining center is one that has a total of five axis of movement (three linear and two rotational axis) for the tool and workpiece combined. Now a five-axis CNC machine can process much more difficult shapes as compared to three-axis CNC machines. However, this five-axis CNC machine is much more difficult to operate and costs much more in terms of labor cost and tooling.
Produce features that are too difficult to machine using conventional machining like CNC machining and turning center can be machined using nonconventional machines like wire cut and die sinking electric discharge machining.
For the specific case of product, we discuss above where there are circular cross-section cuts inside the product. If the inside cuts cannot be machined using a five-axis CNC machining center then it can be processed using Die sinking EDM. For Die-sinking machines, a special tool designed specifically for inside cuts will be used. These EDM machines can process even the most hard materials with ease.
Conclusion:
The main reason why prototype CNC machining service cannot be provided for a certain design is that there are certain features that cannot be machined under a given budget. Various elements contribute to the machining cost, including the design of the product, the material to be machined, the precision required, and the surface finish specifications.
Successfully delivering a prototype CNC machining service requires a combined effort between product designers and prototype CNC machining service providers. For designers it’s all about the DFM technique and for service providers is about providing a versatile machining facility with different machines available for service.
Kinsai is the top name of Precision CNC Machining Services in China. We have 15 years of manufacturing metal and plastic parts and implementing a range of key manufacturing methods including:
1. Precision CNC Machining
2. Precision Grinding
3. Wire EDM Machining
4. Casting
5. Welding and Drilling
We accumulated rich experience in manufacturing high-quality precision CNC machined parts for customers all over the world. If you are looking for CNC prototyping services from China, welcome to contact us for further discussion and a quote.