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agnosto wrote:

insaniak wrote:It would be afar easier to make them in resin than to try to make them in plastic in an injection moulding machine...
.

Just out of curiosity. Why? It would be relatively cheap to send the parts to a die cutting place in China and have them make your dies to make plastics. A $300-$400 investment for dies off of a $400 something (not sure and too lazy to look up the exact price) warhound and you'd be able to make as many as you wanted. Plastic beads are next to nothing they're so cheap, compared to resin.

Because you apparently really don't know anything about making molds. If you took your resin originals and made an injection mold out of them, you would get to use them precisely once, and then they'd be useless, and you wouldn't even get a usable model out of it.

Why?

Because resin pieces use soft molds, which allow for greater rounding and undercuts because you can bend and flex the mold to get the piece out. Do you know what happens if you manage to make an injection mold with an overhang and then put plastic in it? You get a plastic piece that you can't get out of the mold.

It's not jsut ebay;

Dark Sphere is a full store in the Uk that sells at 25% off if you use their website

It's about volume

Bookwrack wrote:

agnosto wrote:

insaniak wrote:It would be afar easier to make them in resin than to try to make them in plastic in an injection moulding machine...
.

Just out of curiosity. Why? It would be relatively cheap to send the parts to a die cutting place in China and have them make your dies to make plastics. A $300-$400 investment for dies off of a $400 something (not sure and too lazy to look up the exact price) warhound and you'd be able to make as many as you wanted. Plastic beads are next to nothing they're so cheap, compared to resin.

Because you apparently really don't know anything about making molds. If you took your resin originals and made an injection mold out of them, you would get to use them precisely once, and then they'd be useless, and you wouldn't even get a usable model out of it.

Why?

Because resin pieces use soft molds, which allow for greater rounding and undercuts because you can bend and flex the mold to get the piece out. Do you know what happens if you manage to make an injection mold with an overhang and then put plastic in it? You get a plastic piece that you can't get out of the mold.

1) Tone it down, we're just having a conversation here. 2) I've never even hinted that I know a damned thing about mold making or anything else thus the, "Just out of curiosity." statement, followed by, "Why?".

The whole thing just seemed feasible to me, if it's not, I could care less because I'm not going to do it. That said, making your own garage recast set-up is not nearly as expensive as some people think which is why I provided the information I did. Luckily, I have enough money to buy anything I want that's hobby related so I don't need to recast, make molds or anything related, it was just an interesting conversation.

Chill dude. Take a 'lude, it'll be alright in the morning.

Although I despise the man, Jordan Weisman of WizKids fame mentioned once that he was stunned at the cost of producing his figures. He bought into the "greedy GW" line of thinking until he started looking into producing his own plastic toys. Jordan cut his costs by using low quality plastic (little more than what's used by glue guns) and Chinese labor. Love them or hate them, GW went for higher quality with their plastics.

Possible or not, producing plastic figures of any decent quality is going to be more than it's worth for counterfitters - at least in the near term.

@ agnosto ... your cost figures for injection molding equipment and dies are at least an order of magnitude too low. Add a zero and double and you are probably in the right ball park.

Regardless of all this talk of moulds and injecting stuff, the Temple Guard and Slann arrived today. Brand new in box and still sealed. Bargain

asmith wrote:@ agnosto ... your cost figures for injection molding equipment and dies are at least an order of magnitude too low. Add a zero and double and you are probably in the right ball park.

I can't attest to the molds because I simply don't care enough to contact a company and there wasn't anything readily available online as far as pricing; however, the machine only runs about $2000 - $4000, used, as I've previously posted a link from e-bay.

It doesn't really matter because I'm not interested in taking up any more space in my garage and have enough trouble finding the time to paint, much less cast my own models.

@ Flashman,
Congrats on the awesome deal.

agnosto wrote:It doesn't really matter because I'm not interested in taking up any more space in my garage and have enough trouble finding the time to paint, much less cast my own models.

Well, perhaps next time if you don't know anything about casting models you should not try to present your mold cost values as correct or approximate. I'm not surprised that people corrected you, and if I were you I would not take offense from the corrections.

ph34r wrote:Well, perhaps next time if you don't know anything about casting models you should not try to present your mold cost values as correct or approximate. I'm not surprised that people corrected you, and if I were you I would not take offense from the corrections.

Unlike the people that, "correct" me. I did a little research, posted links and showed some proof other than just spouting numbers. Heck, if you want to do injection molding at home, on the cheap, check this out:




$375 for the completed package. http://www.backyardengineer.com/products3.html

Now you're going to mention the molds themselves, made out of 1/4" aluminum. Any place with a cnc lathe can cut you a mold, they're much cheaper than they were a few years ago. Or you can just buy your own off of e-bay:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Mini-CNC-Engrave-PCB-Acrylic-Bare-Milling-Basic-Machine-/180517434256?cmd=ViewItem&pt=BI_Tool_Work_Holding&hash=item2a07ad7390

It cuts to a depth of 60mm (2.36 inches) and is designed for use on hard metals/aluminum. I'm sure software and even a 3d scanner to scan the spru will still run you less than the $10,000 that was thrown around earlier in the thread.

You're right. I've been corrected to the extent that no one has even bothered to back up their, "corrections" with facts or proof.

I've hijacked this thread enough and for that I appologize to Flashman and remove myself from further comment.

agnosto wrote:Unlike the people that, "correct" me. I did a little research, posted links and showed some proof other than just spouting numbers. Heck, if you want to do injection molding at home, on the cheap, check this out:
[stuff]

That's pretty cool, home injection molding.

Kirasu wrote:GW says they have a tiered discount system that prevents internet retailers from undercutting brick and mortar.. I certainly dont see it since I know plenty of online only stores that give 30% off

Oh please do tell me about these stores, max Ive seen is 20% off. With or without free shipping. 30% off would be really nice, could you give the urls to all these stores? Since you say plenty there has to be more than 5 right?

agnosto wrote:

ph34r wrote:Well, perhaps next time if you don't know anything about casting models you should not try to present your mold cost values as correct or approximate. I'm not surprised that people corrected you, and if I were you I would not take offense from the corrections.

Unlike the people that, "correct" me. I did a little research, posted links and showed some proof other than just spouting numbers. Heck, if you want to do injection molding at home, on the cheap, check this out:




$375 for the completed package. http://www.backyardengineer.com/products3.html

Now you're going to mention the molds themselves, made out of 1/4" aluminum. Any place with a cnc lathe can cut you a mold, they're much cheaper than they were a few years ago. Or you can just buy your own off of e-bay:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Mini-CNC-Engrave-PCB-Acrylic-Bare-Milling-Basic-Machine-/180517434256?cmd=ViewItem&pt=BI_Tool_Work_Holding&hash=item2a07ad7390

It cuts to a depth of 60mm (2.36 inches) and is designed for use on hard metals/aluminum. I'm sure software and even a 3d scanner to scan the spru will still run you less than the $10,000 that was thrown around earlier in the thread.

You're right. I've been corrected to the extent that no one has even bothered to back up their, "corrections" with facts or proof.

I've hijacked this thread enough and for that I appologize to Flashman and remove myself from further comment.

First of all that little "hobby" moulder will not do the same quality casts as the moulders that GW uses. Huge difference between a used $3,000 injection mould machine (that FYI requires minimum of 240V outlet to run plus cooling) and a $375 hobby injection moulder.

The milling machine on ebay WILL NOT do the kinds of milling you need for the kind of cutting needed to replicate a GW mini. You won't get anywhere near the quality of GW sculpts carving moulds out with that so if you want to recast GW models why even bother with a machine that won't even carve anywhere near the quality? If you are happy carving IG that look like green plastic army men just buy green plastic army men.

The moulds are also not cheap. Not sure where the $300 figure came out (someones ass I'm guessing). I worked production with injection moulders and the cost per mould was around $5k for an aluminum mould with cuts not even close to the detail and depth of what GW's moulds would be cut at. I'd say double that figure. That and if you plan to rip off GW and recast their plastics it's going to take CADCAM software and milling software plus a fairly beefy computer (unless you don't mind waiting a few days for your $200 emachine to complete the 3d drawing of ONE figure for ONE miniature) before the milling machine can even begin to cut PLUS you need to know how to use the milling program.

Average joe won't be able to do that. You don't just take digital photos of a gw mini, scan it into the miller, hit go and it recreates a perfect die for molding.

Resin can be cast for a few hundred dollars. To recast GW minis to be even CLOSE in quality would cost more than $10k. Equipment alone will set you back $10-20K and then you'd have to learn the software so that could cost a few thousand for books or classes (and practice materials).

Selling solid, plastic non-posable vehicles that are obvious copies of GW property is asking for a lawsuit and or legal troubles. Not to mention who the hell is so cheap as to want a cheap knockoff made with probably gakky quality plastic?

Pewter is a lot cheaper to make recasts with, so is resin but as stated earlier you can't use a mould used for plastic for resin. For what it would cost for equipment to cast your own copies of GW minis would buy you lots of ACTUAL GW minis. $10K would probably get you 50-60k points of Orks or even IG, including tanks.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/DAEMONHUNTER-CHIMERA-SCRATCH-BUILT-SUPER-PRO-PAINTED-/200341557087?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_Toys_Wargames_RL&hash=item2ea5498f5f

Only 75£ for this beauty! Its a steal, literally

Cheapest way to get your own minis would be to learn how to sculpt, you can get greenstuff or similar for pretty cheap and get away with about 1£ or less per model soldier.

Fateweaver wrote:First of all that little "hobby" moulder will not do the same quality casts as the moulders that GW uses. Huge difference between a used $3,000 injection mould machine (that FYI requires minimum of 240V outlet to run plus cooling) and a $375 hobby injection moulder.

The milling machine on ebay WILL NOT do the kinds of milling you need for the kind of cutting needed to replicate a GW mini. You won't get anywhere near the quality of GW sculpts carving moulds out with that so if you want to recast GW models why even bother with a machine that won't even carve anywhere near the quality? If you are happy carving IG that look like green plastic army men just buy green plastic army men.

The moulds are also not cheap. Not sure where the $300 figure came out (someones ass I'm guessing). I worked production with injection moulders and the cost per mould was around $5k for an aluminum mould with cuts not even close to the detail and depth of what GW's moulds would be cut at. I'd say double that figure. That and if you plan to rip off GW and recast their plastics it's going to take CADCAM software and milling software plus a fairly beefy computer (unless you don't mind waiting a few days for your $200 emachine to complete the 3d drawing of ONE figure for ONE miniature) before the milling machine can even begin to cut PLUS you need to know how to use the milling program.

Average joe won't be able to do that. You don't just take digital photos of a gw mini, scan it into the miller, hit go and it recreates a perfect die for molding.

Resin can be cast for a few hundred dollars. To recast GW minis to be even CLOSE in quality would cost more than $10k. Equipment alone will set you back $10-20K and then you'd have to learn the software so that could cost a few thousand for books or classes (and practice materials).

Selling solid, plastic non-posable vehicles that are obvious copies of GW property is asking for a lawsuit and or legal troubles. Not to mention who the hell is so cheap as to want a cheap knockoff made with probably gakky quality plastic?

Pewter is a lot cheaper to make recasts with, so is resin but as stated earlier you can't use a mould used for plastic for resin. For what it would cost for equipment to cast your own copies of GW minis would buy you lots of ACTUAL GW minis. $10K would probably get you 50-60k points of Orks or even IG, including tanks.

Prove it.
I at least did a little research. I've never contended that it was cost effective nor did I ever state that people would resell the recasts re re re.
Some people do things themselves, not because they're trying to make money, but because they just want to do it.

Tell you what, if this ever comes up again, I'll just throw low numbers around without backing it up with anything just like some people have done with high numbers.

Oh noez! You can build a machine at home for $100 and make all the recasts you want for pennies! Such an unsubstantiated statement is just as valid as someone spouting out $30k or $40k to make one sprue.

It's all academic anyway and like I said, I was just saying it was possible for much less than the rocket-figures that were shooting at the stars.

Cheers.

@MadCowCrazy,
I made my first figure yesterday..a Chaos Dwarf eruption gun.... looks completely unprofessional but it was fun as heck.

agnosto wrote:Tell you what, if this ever comes up again, I'll just throw low numbers around without backing it up with anything just like some people have done with high numbers.

So in other words, you'll keep on doing exactly what you've been doing in this thread.

Look, it's been pointed out multiple times how your suppositions are flat out wrong - you've admitted multiple times to not actually knowing jack about how casting works. It's like you're trying to argue it's really cheap to build airplanes, because you can build a really rocking plane out of a couple sheets of paper, and here's a link to buying a ream from office max, so why does a 747 cost so much? I mean, it's your choice if you want to ride this ship all the way down, but my recommendation? Chill dude. Take a 'lude, it'll be alright in the morning.

Agnosto wrote:Prove it.

Fateweaver wrote: I worked production with injection moulders and the cost per mould was around $5k for an aluminum mould with cuts not even close to the detail and depth of what GW's moulds would be cut at.

Stop being so dense.
Someone who has actually worked with injection moulding has way more insight into this than someone like you (or me) that's done 15 minutes of googling.

I was actually shocked at the cost. The company I worked for outsourced it's injection diagrams to be machined by another company.

Don't need to "prove it". Google is your friend. Google "CNC" or "milling machines" and look at prices. Anywhere from $3k to $15k. Plus training manuals/classes to learn how to run them (programing them is a lot like writing a program for C or Java). We were very careful where I worked. I worked in shipping/receiving and so I personally signed off on invoices and I can tell you that for our plastic injector the moulds were $5k and up (we had one that was designed to punch out 4 braking light receptacles at one time for trailer brake lights that cost the company I worked for $10k PER mould).

Not to mention the plastic used is not used in that hobby press. It's what GW uses and everyone else that makes plastic parts. It dries rock hard in 15 seconds, is approximately 450 degrees F and is injected into the mould at approximately 100tons per square inch (yes, that much pressure). What that homemade press does for $375 will basically make nothing better than Army Men quality miniatures.

Nothing wrong with casting your own but you won't do it with decent equipment unless you have 20-30k laying around the house and if you have so much money you can invest in 20k worth of equipment just for "the fun of doing your own casting" than send some cash my way. I could use some more Tyranids or even a audio system for my car.

Fateweaver wrote:I was actually shocked at the cost. The company I worked for outsourced it's injection diagrams to be machined by another company.

Don't need to "prove it". Google is your friend. Google "CNC" or "milling machines" and look at prices. Anywhere from $3k to $15k. Plus training manuals/classes to learn how to run them (programing them is a lot like writing a program for C or Java). We were very careful where I worked. I worked in shipping/receiving and so I personally signed off on invoices and I can tell you that for our plastic injector the moulds were $5k and up (we had one that was designed to punch out 4 braking light receptacles at one time for trailer brake lights that cost the company I worked for $10k PER mould).

Not to mention the plastic used is not used in that hobby press. It's what GW uses and everyone else that makes plastic parts. It dries rock hard in 15 seconds, is approximately 450 degrees F and is injected into the mould at approximately 100tons per square inch (yes, that much pressure). What that homemade press does for $375 will basically make nothing better than Army Men quality miniatures.

Nothing wrong with casting your own but you won't do it with decent equipment unless you have 20-30k laying around the house and if you have so much money you can invest in 20k worth of equipment just for "the fun of doing your own casting" than send some cash my way. I could use some more Tyranids or even a audio system for my car.

I missed your earlier post where you said you had worked with injection molding...old eyes or selective reading. Anywho, if I'm wrong, I'm wrong and I'm more than happy to bow to someone who actually has experience in the field but I am also the sort of person that doesn't take people seriously when they just say something is impossible or spouts a random number. In my business, doing that results in loss of career, position, and massive amounts of federal funding so I guess my gut instinct is to just say, "show me." No one showed me so that means they either didn't know or just wanted to be argumentative.

It was all academic to me anyway; I like learning new things and actually ran into some interesting forums where people were running injection molding machines in their homes, mostly for creating model aircraft parts or model railroad items. We may laugh and say, "If I had 20-30k laying around" but apparently some of them do because the machines they were talking about running in their garages were expensive. As for me, I've got plenty of money for the hobby but my perceived value of my little army men is not that high. I recommend you check the board out if you have the time http://www.hobbymolding.com/forum/index.php?sid=dc91dc302c6de747cec35c6dd13253c1

As for this poor, bedraggled topic; I'm afraid everything being derailed from the OP's post is primarily my fault. I appologize to you all.

@Agnosto , i understand what you mean.

Japan / China / HK / Taiwan are used to counterfeiting resin kits and has been doing so for the last 30+ decades.

Such practice are not really done in other places , so you cant really expect them to have the same know how.

But yes , resin wise they can do it very E-A-S-I-L-Y

plastic injecting though its abit different. I agree with you that the chinese can easily make them cheap , but wargamers will never believe you on that.

*edit , dont listen to them when they think illegal casting resin wont work because they are soft mold or w/e
The real lresin casters dont work that way , they pretty much re sculpt the molds to make the detail work.

For the record, regarding the people jumping on agnosto, especially the dude that has experience with injection molding, you must not realize that metal molds are un-necessary as long as you refresh the mold. We use high temp EPOXY molds now. Dirt cheap, and the quality holds up for a good while; I'm not sure how long as I'm still fairly new, but so far 10 to 20 casts with no change at all. You have to be damn good to get it right (I've only manged 3 or 4 what I consider perfect molds so far) but the costs of the epoxy are so low that I can keep trying. Just because you had experience in the way it "used to be" doesn't mean that technology doesn't evolve. I'm also a hobby blacksmith, and have access to a full machine shop at the place I apprentice periodically if I needed it; don't act like a milling machine is an impossibility to get access to. Additionally, if a person was determined to do it the old fashioned way with metal molds, which I imagine do last longer, you can rent time from water cutters at any local technical college, for about 80$ an hour. Look up the cost of a solid block of aluminum, and then tell me how "unfordable" it is. Oh yeah, I can make that solid block myself with an iridium coated crucible (80$ from various places), and can use my gas powered forge (150$ from poorboy forge) to cast IRON; aluminum can collecting and aluminum are much cheaper. In total, if I had NO equipment, and wanted to cast metal molds with SAND and used MOTOR OIL (expensive? hardly) and junk IRON, I could do so for next to nothing. The injection machine itself can be built in miniature for around 350$; just check out amazon. I forget the name of the book offhand, but it's around here somewhere. I didn't end up going that route, but what it taught me was how the process worked. That machine can only do about a half oz of plastic per cast, but you'd be surprised at how much you can do.

I also hear that you can simply melt down GW plastics in a double boiler, similar to that used for candle making and if you can inject within 30 seconds or so, you're using THEIR plastic leftover from FLGS shops which generate several pounds of the sprue material a week, I'm guessing. The cost is with the learning process, but after you've got the hang of it, this argument that it takes thousands of dollars is simply not correct. It's clearly from folks that have never done more than an ounce of homework on the subject.

Also on a final note to the dude that mentioned that we use resin because the molds last longer is mostly spot on. Resin is tougher, easier to work with, and I personally prefer the heft my figure have when made with heavy duty resin overtop of plastics. Given the trouble, plastic injection molding isn't worth it to me personally, but don't think for a second that it's cost prohibitive; just time consuming and not for the slowed. An example of this is a bikini i bought for my wife when we were in Belize 2 months ago. It was an "Ed Hardy" death before Dishonor print. Except that it was spelled "Death before Disnor" Women from the cruise ship bought several of these knockoffs that were absolutely identical, and went for around 5$ each. The guy at the store told me straight up how the process worked. That he had a guy that would tour the production factories in china with a hidden camera, and photograph the prints, take them back to his shop where a computer guy would copy the print, and they'd produce it in his factory with only 50 or so employees, and sell it to vendors like him. Guicci handbags, almost any textile. I bought the bikini, because it was an example of what we're talking about here. People would argue that there was no money in all the work it took to do this, and yet there are entire stores dedicated to this very thing; must be our imaginations.... when the pricepoint of a good goes up unreasonably, it makes these types of operations viable.

For the type of injection molding done where I work you don't use an epoxy mold. It could not withstand the pressure. Maybe a person COULD do cheap knockoffs of GW miniatures for a few hundred in equipment but I know what we used where I worked and nothing was cheap.

I'd actually love to tour the GW plant where the plastics are created. I'm guessing their injectors are the same used where I worked (or similiar) and if that's the case an epoxy mold will not last long under many TSI's (tons per square inch) and 100's of degrees of heat.

Also, unless someone wasn't paying attention and the injector smashed the sprue into the mold because it didn't fall down into the catch bin and got caught when the mold closed during the next cycle the aluminum molds we used were only changed out every 3 years or around 150,000 cycles.

Nobody was jumping on agnosto. He made the argument you can cast your own plastic at home for a few hundred dollars. Yes you can but it won't look anywhere near as good as GW's (or PP or Mantic) and it won't be anywhere near the quality of plastic (green army men are not the same quality of plastic as GW or PP or Mantic plastics).

I mean, I could probaly build a car that would LOOK and SOUND like a Porsche for a LOT less than a Porsche but it still won't be as good of a car as an ACTUAL Porsche.

I think the easiest way to make money with GW counterfeits would be just recasting FW resin titans and such like.

I know of at least one person doing just that, here is one of his first attempts, he has since refined to even more accuracy.

I'm sorry I thought we were talking about people counterfeiting GW sprues at a price low enough to undercut retailers, not about the cheapest way that a hobbiest can form a couple of pieces of plastic.

Those hobby molders you are looking at can shoot maybe one part on a GW sprue, which means to duplicate a kit you are looking at what maybe 50 to 100 molds and individual shots for each.

You'll need a press in excess of 200 Tons I'm estimating to shoot a GW sprue. Not the largest but a pretty substantial piece of machinery. BTW the link to ebay was an undersize outdated machine that you would spend 5 times more refurbishing that the $2900 it's listed at. And when you were done it would still be too small to shoot your sprue.

For such large size sprues you are not going to be using aluminum or epoxy(!?). they aren't going to be strong enough (or last long enough if you are after the cheapest part). You are going to be using hardened tool steel. You are not going to be CNCing the features for the most part. you are going to be making positive electrodes and then using EDM to burn them in.

There are a lot more details than I want to go into now but suffice it to say you guys are way off base with such low numbers. I think for $150K in capital and $10K per each sprue mold and a lot of expertise you could have a decent shot at counterfeiting GW plastics stuff. I doubt however you could sell enough to make it back. If you knew enough to do that by yourself you could make much more money doing something else for a living. using the much smaller machines and cheaper molds in a hobbiest type setup you probably could make individual pieces for bit type sales (probably just making the highest demand bits), but my sense is you would be hard pressed to break even, even counting the inflated prices of those bit sales.

You guys both actually have some good points, but I would like to point out that with a drill press housing that doesn't even need to work, and can be bought brand new from lowes for 75$, plus around 350$ you can easily make your own small injection molding machine. My setup is already larger, so I won't give it a shot, but to anyone wanting to try, it's looks like a very simple process. You can see it here:

http://www.lindsaybks.com/dgjp/djgbk/injatt/index.html

It also gives you the info you need to make your epoxy molds.

As to the pressure rating, I'm not sure offhand. The model I have says it can go up to 300psi, and I haven't broken a mold yet, but as it's a hand press model, I'm not sure that there is a variable control; I think its just using the magic of leverage to gain that. lol

Back on Topic, (In America)

Stores buy at 45% on most products, unless they have large enough volume to get a better rate. GW cannot tell you how much you are allowed to discount. If you want to sell at 50% discount then go for it. You just won't be in business for long.

FOr the OP buying at 25% discount, they are still making 20% profit. Of course in order to buy form GW trade you have to have a brick and mortor store so he will have over head. They could be going for volume of sales to make their over all profit.

As for the Sprues in plastic bags - alot of people sell this way as you are not allowed to advertise and sell NIB on the internet. So if they sell just the sprues they get around the GW legal issues. Also the sprues can be shipped in a bag versues a box and saves on shipping cost.

@ lord manimal - yeah I've built an improved version of gingerys machine. It still has only limited use.

If you think about filling a complicated sprue like GW makes you have to have a large shot size. Not only do you have to have a large shot size but you have to project that shot through the mold fast enough that it doesn't solidify and shut off any of the tiny details before they get a chance to fill with plastic. Since it takes about .5 second for the plastic to solidify once it enters the sprue, you have got to generate tremendous velocity (in some of our simulations on less complex parts than GW makes the flow front can exceed 100mph) to ensure this happens. The way to do this is to use a lot of pressure 200- 500 ton hydraulic presses are not uncommon for this size part. The more detailed a part is the more pressure you have to use, so you either have to experiment or run flow simulations.

Look at a GW part on a sprue. All the plastic in that part has to travel from the main gate (large circular post) through the sprue and through any tiny gating in a fraction of a second. Molten plastic is not like water it's more like clay. Once all the parts are filled you have a couple second cooling cycle, then likely automated part ejection that kicks the sprue out of the mold, and an automated part handling system to move the sprue into a bin.

A manual press is both too slow and not enough pressure to make anything but the simplest of parts.

jbunny wrote:Back on Topic, (In America)

Stores buy at 45% on most products, unless they have large enough volume to get a better rate. GW cannot tell you how much you are allowed to discount. If you want to sell at 50% discount then go for it. You just won't be in business for long.

Not sure where you got your numbers.
When I was involved with it (and, granted, this HAS been a little while), stores bought @ 50% of retail.

GW charges 60% of retail. Check with your local FLGS.

Eric

I might of mistyped it. You (the store) buys it at 45% off MSRP.

I got my numbers directly from GW trade, about 7 months ago.

Asmith,

I've worked with metal molding (mostly aluminum, some steel) before, and one thing I would do to reduce the required pressures is to heat the mold. If you're going something where you don't need a low cycle time, such as making knock-off 40k bits, then this would improve the fluidity of the plastic by increasing the time it takes to solidfy.

From reading your posts, it sounds to me like you've done industrial injection molding, which is a different animal than a hobbiest injection molder.

Yeah you are right of course, I have been speaking from the point of view of someone trying to counterfeit whole sprues from GW and do so in a manner in which they could undercut the cost. (I thought that was the topic at hand)

Like you say you can do some cool stuff with hobby injection molders on a limited number of parts but its not really cost effective. I don't think you could make a living at it. Resin or metal is really a lot more cost effective for small scale.

Edit:

I hope I haven't put anybody off injection molding if you are interested in it. I was only trying to refute the thinking that you could start making GW sprues wholesale for a couple of grand. Injection molding is capital intensive in that the more you pay up front the cheaper the part will be in the end. You can use these home systems and cheaper tools to make a part or even hundreds of parts, but you aren't going to be able to use them to make full size sprues for cheaper than you can buy them (unless you are willing to invest the money).