Mechanical Manufacturing in Plastic and Metal
Mechanical components often determine your product’s durability, aesthetics and user experience. Whether it is an aluminium chassis or a plastic enclosure for technical, industrial or medical-related products, the choice of material and manufacturing method has a significant impact on the overall result and final quality.
LM Projects acts as your single supplier for custom mechanical manufacturing in both plastic and metal. We guide you through the trade-offs between tooling costs, unit prices, tolerances and material properties, ensuring that your mechanical components are designed and manufactured to fit correctly with electronics, cables and other components.
Plastic Manufacturing: From Prototype to Mass Production
We can support the entire product lifecycle for plastic manufacturing and help move your project from prototype tooling to production tooling once the expected volumes and business case have been established.
Plastic Injection Moulding
For volume production, injection moulding provides low unit costs, high repeatability and efficient scalability. Through our global network, we offer:
- Mass Production: Cost-effective scaling from thousands to millions of components.
- Complex geometries: Manufacturing of complex plastic parts with options such as overmoulding, insert moulding and multi-component injection moulding.
- Material flexibility: We source and use the material you specify and can advise on material selection if alternatives are required.
Tooling Economics: Making the Right Choice
The mould is often the largest upfront investment in plastic manufacturing. We help optimise this cost by ensuring that your tooling strategy is aligned with the requirements and objectives of your project.
Rather than relying on a single standard approach, we adapt the tooling solution to your specific needs based on factors such as:
- Technical complexity: We align the mould design with the component’s level of detail and required tolerances.
- Production volume: We scale the tooling solution to your expected output, whether you require a smaller pilot run or full-scale mass production.
- Material: We take the specific properties of your selected polymer into account.
Metal Manufacturing: Precision and Strength
We manufacture robust metal components using a range of different production methods.
CNC Machining: Milling and Turning
CNC machining is a subtractive manufacturing method used for precision components in metal and other engineering materials.
- Ideal for: Low- to medium-volume production, complex geometries and tight tolerances, such as heat sinks and custom-designed brackets.
- Materials: Including aluminium, stainless steel, brass and a wide range of engineering plastics.
Aluminium Die Casting
We support aluminium and magnesium die casting for the efficient production of complex geometries with high dimensional stability.
- Ideal for: Volume production of robust enclosures, such as housings used outdoors or in other demanding environments.
Sheet Metal Fabrication
Sheet metal fabrication includes cutting, bending and joining metal sheets.
- Ideal for: Enclosures, chassis structures and panels. We manage processes such as laser cutting, punching, bending and welding.
Design Optimisation and Design for Manufacturing (DFM)
We do more than manufacture components; we also help prepare your design for production. Before tooling is manufactured or production begins, we review your design together with the relevant manufacturing partners, focusing on functionality, tolerances, material selection and production economics.
We often recommend adjustments to:
- Optimise the subsequent tooling design
- Ensure quality in subsequent production
- Achieve a cost-efficient manufacturing process
Consolidated Sourcing of Mechanical Components
Sourcing mechanical components may require coordination between several manufacturers of plastic parts, metal parts, standard components and other items.
LM Projects can consolidate this process and help ensure that the components are specified, manufactured and inspected with the complete product in mind.
- Integrated fit verification: By managing the production of multiple components, we can help ensure that the parts fit together correctly before shipment.
- Consistent surface finishing: We manage finishing processes including anodising, powder coating, painting and screen printing to achieve a consistent visual appearance across materials and components.
Ready for Integration?
Mechanical components rarely stand alone; they often house PCBs, cables and other technical components.
- Is your PCB ready? Explore our electronics manufacturing services.
- Do you need a finished product? Let us integrate your mechanical and electronic components into a complete unit with our box-build assembly service.
Optimise Your Mechanical Manufacturing
Avoid the complexity of coordinating multiple plastic and metal suppliers. Send us your CAD file, technical drawing, material requirements or an existing component, and together we will identify the right manufacturing process for your project.
