Close Molding.......

[nastro]

Hello,

As many of the people on the board are aware, there is a fairly large initiative around open molding in the US. This initiative is being driven by the EPA and many communities where the open molders have been doing business for years. It has been recognized for in recent years as the pressure has increase that the most efficient means to over come this issue is through close molding.

My company has a vast amount of knowledge around manufacturing and designing parts for many close molding applications. What we lack is intimate knowledge of the marine industry and marine craft design. In order to make close molding truly cost affective there has to be a certain amount of volume to justify the up front expense and the tooling.

We are looking for some ideas and parts that are common on most types of mass produced marine craft that could be common or interchangeable which in turn should provide the volume needed to justify the cost.

Please feel free to e-mail or PM

Brian

[DanishBagger]

Sea Ray uses (used?) closed modling for their hulls - hardly an "interchangeable part", haha ;-)

Anyway, the only (semi-)interchangeable parts I can think of off-hand are hatches (usually done in aluminium, steel or bronze), engine parts, stanchions, and other fittings. Unfortunately, most of these are done in metals, unless we're talking cheapo-parts which are done in cheap-arse plastics such as nylon. Oh, some "hatches" (those small round waterproof ones) are usually done in good plastics (no nylon).

Other than that, I can't think of anything that are interchangeable, and certainly not between different types of boats.

Edit: You might want to have a look through some big chandleries on the web to see what could be produced. Just remember you have to design your own ;-)

[Fanie]

Hi Brian,

There is defenately a market for better priced items like hatches, ports and so on that would require mass production. It would be easier to design that those items can be used if it available. Some items are rediculously expensive probably simply because they are made in low volumes.