Prototype Fabrication Overview

This article will provide you with information on how to fabricate your prototype. We will include the following:

• The product design stage

• Companies that provide prototype fabrication

• How to choose the right company

• How we at Prototype Finder can help

First, let us examine how to create a prototype so that you can one day bring your product to market.

The Product Design Stage

Product design is the first key critical step in creating any kind of product prototype. This involves an independent product design engineer, or one of the many design firms. They receive your initial sketch or description of a product that you have in mind. Then they create it within a 3D design software. This software is usually something called AutoCAD. CAD standing for computer-aided design. Customers often make a choice to go with one of two options. Either a product design company or go with a freelance engineering designer. Freelance designers are often found on an online platform like Fiverr.

What should you be aware of with design companies? These can sometimes include a product sketching service. This is where the product designer helps you to draw the prototype first. Building your sketched product on CAD software.

Companies that do Prototype Fabrication

Our second step is to examine who exactly are the companies that make prototypes. There are actually many different types of companies that can do this. Some companies include product design services, while others don’t. Others are more expensive when it comes to product prototyping. While others are more cost-effective. Let us look at some of these companies below:

Rapid Prototyping / 3D Printing Services – Prototypes aren’t often produced in large numbers. (Usually less than 100 units). Small 3D printing shops can offer prototyping services. They also have solid turnaround speeds and seen in most big cities. The downside is that they often don’t have trained professionals who can help provide input on your idea. Nor do they support you through to the later stages of mass production.

Design Firms – Capable of product design engineering and prototyping. These companies have skilled engineers working for them. The biggest issue for an industrial design company are the costs involved. As it is not farfetched to spend up to hundreds of thousands of dollars. This makes it a poor choice for many start-ups and inexperienced entrepreneurs.

Manufacturers – Capable of scaling from prototype to production. They also have experts with strong industry know-how. Often the best choice when considering getting help from a company. One that knows what they are doing, but also not requesting insane production costs.

Which company can help when it comes to design engineer invention? There are several different kinds of companies. Some are more knowledgeable in design manufacturing. While others are cheaper or more experienced.

Choosing the Best Prototype Fabrication Company

It can be difficult finding the right company who will help build your prototypes . You must be aware of core factors when choosing product development companies. So let’s look at some of these factors below:

Cost – Customers always look for a cost-effective option. Unsurprising when you consider how those costs could increase or decrease. Based on location, employee costs, materials used and faster turnaround times.

Experience – There are many firms that can help you when developing your product. Experience is important for many factors. These can include factors like knowing the right kind of plastic you need for your prototype. Knowing the best kind of plastic manufacturing process for your needs. Also knowing the quickest way to bring your project to life. Reducing costs and increasing production speeds.

Reliability – Coinciding with experience. The best option is choosing a company with many years in the industry. Because they have learned through experience. They know what they are doing and haven’t abandoned their customers or their needs. A reliable prototype design company will have one product engineer veteran or several. Making sure that your product prototype becomes a real, tangible product.

Speed – Everyone wants their product to get made fast. While reaching the best standards. Things can only run well when there is competent product engineering. Development prototypes always have the possibility of incurring issues. This is why a professional product manufacturer should be aware of possible issues. These problems may arise during the production lifecycle. That way, they can keep you up to speed with what is going on and correct any problems, should they occur.

Be aware of important factors when choosing the best prototyping company. Experience, reliability, speed and price!

Why Choose Prototype Finder

But why bother spending hours and hours scrolling through manufacturing websites? No one knows best about prototype fabrication than us here at Prototype Finder. The clue is in the name! Lead by British mechanical engineer Mike Hutchinson. Prototype Finder is a Chinese-based manufacturing company. We have dozens of years’ experience producing parts. Working with a variety of plastics and productions methods. Including injection molding, blow molding and CNC machining! Contact us for more information and we will be happy to respond as soon as possible.

You won’t find a better company that knows how to build a prototype than Prototype Finder. Contact us today!

Conclusion

In this article we walked through how to make a prototype. Exactly what are the steps we need to make a prototype. Including taking into account the design. The companies which can produce your prototype and which factors you need to look out for. This is so you can decide which is the best company for you to choose in your next prototyping project.

We here at Prototype Finder know a great deal about what it takes to build a prototype. This is because we are a prototype manufacturing company! We have worked with prototype development and prototype manufacturing for many years.

Should your project need a prototype engineer? Or are you looking for a company that knows how to get an idea manufactured? If you are not sure what to do next, contact us and request a quote! Or you can indeed ask us any questions and we will be more than happy to assist in any way we can!

If you enjoyed this article make sure you take a look at some of our other posts on many other materials and topics. Learn about Galvanized Steel vs Stainless Steel. Or try PTFE (Teflon) to learn about this interesting material. Understand Turning and Milling Stock for an incredible machining process. These and more are on our Blog.