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Videos
Mantle Process Animation Video - Automated Toolmaking Technology
This video explains how Mantle’s TrueShape process produces parts with exceptional accuracy and surface finish.
With Mantle it’s Possible: How Heyco Products Adopted Metal 3D Printing to Bring Products to Market Faster
Learn how Heyco Products uses Mantle’s metal 3D printing technology for toolmaking to accelerate product development, reduce lead times, solve labor challenges, and increase toolroom capacity.
3D PRINTED TOOLING WITH METAL PASTE: THE MANTLE PROCESS EXPLAINED
Mantle has a metal 3D printing process focused on injection mold tooling. Peter Zelinski from Additive Manufacturing media visited Mantle’s facility in California, and gives this explanation of the steps in the process.
WHY MANTLE? HEAR FIRSTHAND FROM MANTLE’S CUSTOMER WESTMINSTER TOOL
Hear from Mantle’s customer Westminster Tool on why they chose to invest in Mantle’s technology for metal 3D printed tooling, and the value it adds to their business
HOW IT WORKS: MANTLE’S METAL 3D PRINTING FOR TOOLMAKING
Mantle’s TrueShape technology is specifically designed for 3D printing tooling and delivers the accuracy, surface finish, and tool steel properties required for demanding tooling components
White Papers
While many metal 3D printing methods have established a niche in their respective applications tooling has long been a target for various approaches. This white paper serves as a guide to understanding the major metal 3D printing technologies and their role in printing injection mold tooling.
ACCELERATING GEAR PRODUCTION WITH 3D PRINTED TOOLING
The process of prototyping plastic gears has traditionally been an expensive and time-consuming endeavor that inhibits the speed of product development and limits companies’ agility in meeting customer demands.
3D printed tooling offers great promise in accelerating the development of plastic gearing, dramatically reducing lead times and costs.
UNDERSTANDING CONFORMAL COOLING
For the injection molding industry, conformal cooling has historically offered great promise, but come with manufacturing challenges. This white paper explores the advantages of conformal cooling and the new possibilities that Mantle’s metal 3D printing technology brings and how customers are ut
Tooling components like cavities, cores, and sprue bushings benefit greatly from automated production with metal 3D printing technology.
Download the white paper to learn how molders, tool shops, and OEMS are using Mantle to:
- Reduce cycle times and mitigate common molding defects
- Reduce lead times
- Reduce costs
- Reduce dependency on highly skilled labor
Webinars
Reducing product development cycles is critical to success in today’s competitive manufacturing landscape. This webinar will explore how rapid tooling dramatically accelerates product development by leveraging cutting-edge technologies like metal 3D printing for injection molds. Attendees will learn how Mantle’s technology enables manufacturers to create production-quality steel tools with unprecedented speed, precision, and durability to produce production equivalent prototype molded parts.
Rapid tooling allows teams to iterate designs faster, validate part functions earlier, and scale into production seamlessly from prototype to production.
If plastic parts are strategic to your organization, this is a must-attend event to learn how to bring products to market faster.
Key Takeaways:
- Common methods, with pros and cons, of how plastic parts are prototyped today
- How rapid tooling accelerates the product development process and when to use it
- Real-world case studies from manufacturers who have shortened product development cycles by up to 80%
In this webinar, Nicolet Plastics will share real-world examples of utilizing Mantle’s metal 3D printing to reduce tooling lead times and lower costs compared to traditional mold building. Learn how this cutting-edge technology drives value for Nicolet Plastics’ existing customers while also winning them new business.
- Introduction to Nicolet Plastics and their approach to custom plastic injection molding
- How Nicolet has incorporated metal 3D printing for tooling
- Overview of Mantle’s unique hybrid 3D printing technology for injection mold tooling
- Case studies from Nicolet Plastics showcasing reduced lead times and cost savings in comparison to traditional toolmaking
- Discussion on the benefits of integrating advanced metal 3D printing technology into existing manufacturing processes
Hear from Prescott Sutter, Mantle’s Head of Customer Success and Applications Engineering, as we cover one of the most requested topics—understanding Mantle part costs and throughput.
Prescott will break down critical insights, including:
- A detailed breakdown of the factors contributing to Mantle part costs and throughput
- What is an ideal tool for Mantle’s metal 3D printing technology
- How to optimize tooling designs to maximize efficiency with Mantle’s process
- Questions and answers
We sit down with Mantle’s Director of Process Engineering, Michael Kottman, who will share specifics on how our process engineering team developed Mantle’s print process specifically for the production of injection mold tooling.
- In this 30-minute session, we’ll explore:
- A detailed overview of Mantle’s process from beginning to end
- Software
- Tool steel paste
- Printing and shaping
- Sintering
- Secondary operations and finishing
- Success stories with data on cost and lead time savings
- Case studies with data on cost and lead times of Heyco’s successes.
Heyco Products is a leader in wire protection products. It considers its vertical integration of molding and toolmaking a competitive advantage, allowing it to respond more quickly to the market. Heyco faces significant challenges in producing and sourcing mold tooling, like many manufacturers. By implementing metal 3D printing technology for toolmaking, they increase the capacity of its toolroom, lowering lead times and costs without needing additional toolmakers while attracting and retaining the next generation of toolmaking talent.
- How to implement metal 3D printing for toolmaking
- How Heyco is accelerating product development with metal 3D printed tooling.
- Case studies with data on cost and lead times of Heyco’s successes.
Join us as we sit down with Micheal Belmont and Mustafa Hossaini to discuss firsthand how they use metal 3D-printed tooling to win business.
- How using metal 3D-printed tooling can offer shorter lead times than competitors
- Why metal 3D-printed tooling can help you engage with customers earlier in development to win their production business
- Using metal 3D-printing to enable your customers with the fastest path to plastic part validation
- Applying lessons learned from 3D printed tooling to reduce the development time of production tooling
- Case study examples with lead time and cost data compared to traditional toolmaking and how it led to new business
The toolmaking industry is facing significant labor shortages, yet the demand for domestic tooling is on the rise. This webinar will explore data around toolmaker labor challenges and discuss how toolshops and molders leverage technology to thrive and secure their future in this challenging landscape.
- Deep dive into the data
- Brief introduction to Mantle
- Case studies where labor challenges are solved with metal 3D printing
- Additional case studies with real metrics about cost and time savings
Hear first-hand from General Pattern, an injection molder with in-house tooling services and over 100 years of experience, is addressing the labor issue, increasing toolmaking capacity and helping OEMs accelerate product development by integrating Mantle’s 3D printer to automate its toolmaking processes.
- Hear from General Pattern on their additive manufacturing journey and why they invested in Mantle
- Review case studies of how General Pattern reduces tooling lead times and addresses skilled labor shortages with Mantle
- Additional case studies with real metrics about cost and time savings
Join Mantle, Westminster Tool, and Medical Product Outsourcing for a free webinar on how OEMs use metal 3D printing to accelerate product development by printing steel injection mold tooling.
- Westminster Tool will give an overview of their journey with additive manufacturing and why they invested in a Mantle system
- Westminster Tool will share case studies on how they are supporting the product development needs of medical device manufacturers with Mantle tooling
- Additional case studies with real metrics about cost and time savings
In this presentation, we will discuss real-world examples of how manufacturers use metal 3D printing technologies for tooling. Real data on cost and lead time savings compared to traditional moldmaking processes will be presented.
- A brief introduction to Mantle
- Real-world case studies with data on how metal 3D printing has been successfully implemented to produce injection mold tooling
- Using conformal cooling
Unlike traditional metal 3D printing systems, Mantle’s 3D printer is designed to be deployed within existing facilities without requiring extensive modifications or safety measures. This webinar will dive into nine key aspects of Mantle’s printing technology that facilitate this ease of integration and highlight its promise to redefine tooling.
- A brief introduction to Mantle and an overview of how the technology works
- What makes Mantle the only metal 3D printer designed specifically for tooling
- The nine ways Mantle is designed to go on your shop floor
DEEP DIVE: SOFTWARE
Join Mantle for a deep dive into our TrueShape software. Mantle’s software automatically does all programming for additive and subtractive toolpaths, removing the time-consuming and costly CAM step from tool building. Since the TrueShape process alternates between printing material and machining material, parts can have detailed, deeply inset features produced with ease.
- Overview of how Mantle’s software allows for tool pathing without programming
- An explanation of the benefits Mantle’s software provides alongside the TrueShape process
- A live demo of the software being used to prepare a build
Learn how manufacturers shave months off their product development cycles by producing steel tools during the prototyping stage. Steel tools allow for production-quality molded parts early in development for functional prototyping, trials, and process validation. After the design is locked, these tools can be used to bridge into production.
- Traditional methods to validate product function and manufacturing processes
- How metal 3D printed tooling can be used to accelerate product development
- Case studies of customers using metal 3D printing to accelerate product development
MOLDMAKING SIMPLIFIED: HOW NICOLET PLASTICS ARE ADOPTING METAL 3D PRINTING
Nicolet Plastics, a full-service, custom plastic injection molder, joins to give a first-hand overview of how Mantle’s technology is evolving their business.
- Learn about the metal 3D printing landscape and how it has attempted to solve the challenges of injection mold tooling and where it has fallen short
- Learn about Mantle’s unique hybrid approach to printing injection mold tooling
- See examples of how tool shops like yours are reducing lead times and costs with Mantle printed tooling
- Hear firsthand from Nicolet Plastics on their additive journey and why they chose to invest in a Mantle system
REDEFINING METAL 3D PRINTING FOR INJECTION MOLD TOOLING
Join Mantle’s CEO and co-founder, Ted Sorom, and Additive Manufacturing editor-in-chief, Pete Zelinski, for a discussion on the metal 3D printing landscape for injection mold tooling.
Ted will share why he started Mantle to address the specific challenges of tooling, talk about the latest advancements in the industry, and discuss examples of how injection molders, OEMs, and tool shops are automating their toolmaking with Mantle.
- Toolmaking challenges faced by molders, toolmakers and OEMs
- Metal 3D printing landscape for tooling
- Introduction to Mantle’s metal 3D printing technology for toolmaking and how it differs from traditional and other metal 3D printing methods
- Detailed look at Mantle’s technology including accuracy, surface finish and material properties
- Examples of how molders, toolmakers and OEMs have implemented Mantle to reduce tooling lead times and costs
MOLDMAKING SIMPLIFIED: HOW WESTMINSTER TOOL APPLIED METAL 3D PRINTING TO BOOST EFFICIENCIES
In this webinar, you will learn how tool shops are using Mantle’s hybrid metal 3D printing system to reduce lead times and costs by eliminating or reducing toolmaking operations.
- Learn about the metal 3D printing landscape and how it has attempted to solve the challenges of injection mold tooling and where it has fallen short
- Learn about Mantle’s unique hybrid approach to printing injection mold tooling
- See examples of how tool shops like yours are reducing lead times and costs with Mantle printed tooling
- Hear firsthand from Nicolet Plastics on their additive journey and why they chose to invest in a Mantle system
Material Performance Studies
H13 MATERIAL PERFORMANCE STUDY
Review the results of extensive testing of how Mantle’s printed H13 performs and compares to traditional H13 tool steel. Results include:
- tool modification performance after milling and drilling, machining and grinding, welding, and EDM operations
- performance after polishing, coating, plating, and texturing surface finish operations
- heat treatment characteristics
- hardness testing
- mold wear after high-volume run and low-volume run using abrasive material
MATERIAL DATA SHEETS
420
420 Stainless Steel is the ideal tooling material when high-hardness is needed with corrosion resistance.
H13
Mantle’s H13 material acts like standard H13 tool steel and can be hardened to greater than 50 Rockwell C.