The biggest benefit plastic injection moulding offers the medical device industry is versatility. This can be attributed to the range of medical components and the type of materials suitable for the injection moulding process.
- Range of medical components
Injection moulding can produce single use smaller components and assemblies, such as consumable tools for surgeons and dentists. Or it can be used to create larger Medical Devices such as those portable devices used in hospitals at point of care.There are a variety of different processes that can add value to your injection moulded Medical component. These can include inserting, sonic welding, bonding with adhesive, Tampo Pricing and EMC coating.
OGM Medical has helped customers with a wide range of components and assemblies using the processes mentioned with low volume or with high volume automated production.
These include clinical housings and casings, dental instruments, specialist syringes, implantable components, orthopaedic devices and connectors for surgical robots.
- Types of medical grade polymers
Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), polypropylene (PP), polyethylene (PE), polycarbonate (PC) and polystyrene (PS) have traditionally been used for many medical applications.Newer materials with improved performance such as copolyester, polybutylene terephthalate PBT and TPX™ (PMP) polymethyl pentene are now starting to replace these.
Other benefits of the plastic injection moulding process:
- Detail in design – flexibility and complexity
Plastic injection moulding allows for detail in the design of your part and complex geometries. Experts in injection moulding for medical devices will be able to ensure that any intricate features you need on your finished part are considered at design stage.
- Production Development
OGM offer first step prototyping service to help realise injection moulded designs for initial validation and verification.Before injection mould tool manufacture, careful designing for injection moulding will ensure that a design can be transferred to production.
- Reliability, repeatability and quality
Plastic injection moulding is a tried and tested manufacturing process that is particularly suited to producing high quality medical components. The first step to ensure a reliable and repeatable process is to carry out a full production part approval process (PPAP). This will include IQ (Installation Qualification) documentation, a process flowchart, OQ (Operational Qualification) trial, metrology report and PQ (Performance Qualification). OGM specialises in injection moulding for the medical industry and can offer standard validation programmes or tailored programmes depending on specific requirements.
- Cost-effective
Once your mould tool has been made it will be used to make hundreds of thousands of parts with very little need for major maintenance or repair. This provides high-volume production with low part cost.
- Less waste material
Less raw material is used and wasted during the plastic injection moulding process, compared with other manufacturing methods such as CNC machining, milling or casting. A large proportion of polymers can also be recycled and reused. You can find out more about this by talking with one of our injection moulding specialists.
Contact our team for help bringing your product to market. We have experts in design, prototyping and material selection.