Rapid tooling has many names. It is also called soft tooling and prototype tooling. So, what makes it different? Rapid tooling is a modification of injection tooling that enables you to make parts at a low cost and quickly.

Another description of rapid tooling that is easy to understand goes this way: it is the result of combining the techniques in rapid prototyping with conventional tooling to produce mold quickly. It is cheaper because it uses a functional model from CAD data.

Uses of Rapid Tooling

The main reason why many companies require rapid tooling is to use it for testing and validating the parts in new product development. There are many other options for prototyping like CNC, vacuum casting, or 3D printing, but rapid tooling is a lot cheaper and faster. This is made possible because of the process and the materials used.

The cost of expensive tooling can be costly, which is fair when the required quantity is high. But if you only need a small manufacturing quantity, the best choice would be rapid tooling. There is always a need for prototyping as the demand for new products is never-ending. And the amounts of prototypes are usually in small quantities and used only for functional testing, evaluation, marketing, and designing the production process.

There are two main advantages that rapid tooling possesses: tooling time is quicker, and the cost is lower than that of conventional tooling. However, its drawback is on the tool life and the broader tolerances.

But these challenges do not stop companies from turning to rapid tooling. Many companies do not mind them because it has more pluses than its minuses.

Benefits of Rapid Tooling

Rapid tooling has several merits, including:

• It becomes easier to market a product than the scheduled time.

• The products can be sold at a lower price because the tooling cost is lower compared to mass production using injection molding.

• It enables us to produce products from different materials.

• It lowers the time and cost to manufacture a product.

• Rapid tooling can also help in troubleshooting the existing design problems.

• It can also help in creating molds for commercial purposes because the turnaround time is shorter.

Perhaps the best benefit that rapid tooling can give is in customization for personal applications. It eliminates trial and error because it uses a CAD program to fix an existing problem.