Charles Angelich wrote in a message to Roy J. Tellason:

LE>> Well, you either have to "machine" parts, use fairly standard 
LE>> "folded" metal cases, or use "molded" parts.
And injection molding 
LE>> is currently the only practical way to mold plastic plarts for 
LE>> many purposes. 

LE>> Alas, the molds required are fairly high precision blocks of solid 
LE>> steel. That's required by the pressures and temps involved. Which 
LE>> makes them expensive. 

RJT> Are solid steel molds really required for one-off or low-volume 
RJT> runs, though? 

LE>> There's no method that's cheap for low volume use. 

RJT> I wonder, but then I don't know enough about manufacturing 
RJT> processes, which all seem to be geared toward high-volume anyway. 

CA> I do know. 



CA> If you think about this for a minute or two all manuf _began_ as 
CA> low volume and developed into high volume over a period of decades. 
CA> The low volume methods are used today when the volume is low. LOL

You have a point there.

CA> Vacuum molding can use wooden molds and foam molding (not unlike 
CA> what people squirt into cracks in their windows to seal out the 
CA> cold) present little to no pressure on the tooling.

CA> Low to no pressure molding would limit access to certain _types_ of 
CA> plastic but for a case to hold other parts that shouldn't be a 
CA> problem.

Hm.  Is any of this applicable to making stuff at home?  Or is it only
something you'd want to get into for a certain volume of "stuff"?

---