A Personal Opinion About The Case (Moulding)

[droneb]

well, i didnt go thru all 29 pages of the another post around, i just went directly to pandorapress images.

i expect more photos from the assembled unit in order to see the real quality. (also maybe if we clean them a bit we could see actual cosmetical looks),any extra opinions are welcome as long as they dont come with hey another thread about cases.

well here it goes.
(order from left to right top to bottom in Pandorapress)
* photo 1 (below)
actually this one looks pretty good, maybe they need some more re-working(finishing) on it but it will pull up ICF (indirect Cost of Fabrication).
lines all look sharp and steady and just a small blob (maybe injecting point/sprue) below the left batt tab lock.
recomendations:i would suggest some cleaning to see actual quality, also testing how well the batt lid fits.

* photo 2 (behind/ports)
im sad with this one, is this one just on air or the upper piece doesnt fit at all with the lower one? left opening seems wider than the right one.
next they missed some material injection time/ammount so they got a lil sinking between tvout port and USB 2.0
worst part is the looks of hinge part looks cracked (it might not be, but it will be soon, this is a mechanical fail point).
recomendations: i believe this is not a mould fault but a bad parameter settings or a bad injecting machine (the guides are missplaced or the injection valve on the head of the screw is damaged and leaking back.)

* photo 3 (cloded top)
cosmetically looks pretty good, not sure if right side of hinge ending is jagged piece? since the left one is a straight line i believe it is just dust and reflections, light pipe could use some more reworking in order to make them less sharp. and logo area im not sure if this place is way too thin or its just a changeable piece so when cooling down leaving those marks.
recomendations: some reworking on light pipe area, check if logo area is way too thing so it could end up cracking on mechanical stress.

*photo 4 (open front/above)
its like the beauty and the beast, keyboard surely would get a green light, but screen one( inner) looks atrocious since it just looks pure recycled material, a lil too small for the outer piece, only thing that looks average is the hinge are that doesnt seems so dusty/scratched like the rest, logo area (non visible) really seems thin, (was this done on purpose so the logo could get lit??) speakers looks good.
recomendations: check logo area, clean lid if dirty (looks so greasy) and re photo it. also i dont know anything about the hinge but in this photo looks a bit out of place.

... sorry gotta go and get dinner and ill get back soon to end this post.

... OK im Back.

* photo 5( top lid front open)

ok, now my bet is that this piece is actually greasy and needs proper lighting in order to see the semi matte ending, either the inside piece is way too small or the outer one is a lil bit big, anyway the opening between those (outer line next to screw holes and speaker). some bending on the lower side (below the lower set of screw) or maybe just an optical effect of the camera.
recomendations: cleaning the piece in order to remove grease and re-photo it.

* photo 6 (keyboard closeup)
gorgeous photo, injection looks good, maybe need some reworking to led light pipe area, best pic of all no visible mechanical or cosmetic issues also lower part (partially visible) seems pretty good on visible areas.
Recomendations: clean it up assemble and get it sent to a DEV ASAP.

* photo 7 (front ports and keyboard)
cant say much on this, maybe when put together, meanwhile both pieces look straight and no jagged parts, looks that fit will go well, all keyboard holes look good except for the "/" key (most left lower one) a lil bit jagged. on the far side (is that hinge floating?
Recomendations: put em together and get it silkscreened!!! (besides that i dont see any mechanical failure point).

* photo 8 (full front snapshot)
looks good! not so greasy like the other ones, still i want to see it free of those lil white debris like from low Q. wool.
hmm, nub holes could get some reworking in order to shave off those jagged areas.
Recomendations: Clean and shave nub holes.

Conclusions.
well, all the issues doesnt seem to be mould based at all, i bet all of this could be easily fixed just by making proper injecting and using a better quality material, i dont think they will ever use full virgin material but at least they should get a better recycled/virgin proportion in order to keep structural quality.

cosmetically i dont see any big issues, and mechanically i need to see an assembled unit before saying looks good. my only worry is about the hinge crack/mark and the injection quality of the screen lid pieces.

and as a general recomendations, would be if the provider can get better quality by doing actual MP runs they just need to get a proper setup of the injection machines. and for MW please clean those parts go get some glass cleaning liquid and cloth, assemble one unit and re-take those photos!.

 

[gruso]

Screencapped for reference:

Not clickable of course, but these ones are: http://pandorapress....any-many-words/

[edit] Before anyone shouts at "yet another thread", MWeston asked for opinions from people who have worked in this field. Let's try to keep the shipping speculation & opinion out of this thread, and keep the topic to questions & answers on injection moulding. A bit more knowledge in this area will do all of us some good.

 

[shunun]

by the way im not a mould expert i've just seen too much of the process, the issues, the production, the human error and the making of moulds.
you can ask me bout injecting or about plastic products but i can only say my answers are based on my experience over 9 years now of jobs with plastic Co.

Sounds to me like you know a fair bit about plastic?

 

[droneb]

Thanks Gruso, for the photos and the bottom comment

i gave this opinion since a lot of people thinks injecting moulds is an easy task
but the truth, people dont actually know how complex it is, some just think reading some pages of wiki and they know it all.

also im amazed that the more complex part seems the best out of all.

by the way im not a mould expert i've just seen too much of the process, the issues, the production, the human error and the making of moulds.
you can ask me bout injecting or about plastic products but i can only say my answers are based on my experience over 9 years now of jobs with plastic Co.

Sounds to me like you know a fair bit about plastic?

i've seen several issues over the years with several diferent plastic processing process, but i have never operated nor a single machine of those (because it is not my job, the closest im into operating them is when i translate system GUI)

 

[gruso]

Someone posted this link in the blog comments: Trouble Shooting for Injection Molding Process

A bit of insight into how complicated it can be to resolve seemingly minor issues.

 

[droneb]

Someone posted this link in the blog comments: Trouble Shooting for Injection Molding Process

A bit of insight into how complicated it can be to resolve seemingly minor issues.

yes as i said before, minor issues are harder to fix than bigger flaws

 

[Phawx]

I have a question. MWeston said he got seven cases. Do all seven cases have the same crack on the hinge?

 

[Sphinxter]

I'll take mwestons word for the quality and condition of the cases sent and am not about to assume anything which just about everyone in every other thread has made invalidating everything that followed. I just want to point out a pure black, red or any really dark color is rather difficult to obtain consistency on and they might get more acceptable results if they were to settle for a neutral gray or any lighter color that could vary several shades without turning muddy.

ed; This is from my personal experience.

 

[droneb]

I'll take mwestons word for the quality and condition of the cases sent and am not about to assume anything which just about everyone in every other thread has made invalidating everything that followed. I just want to point out a pure black, red or any really dark color is rather difficult to obtain consistency on and they might get more acceptable results if they were to settle for a neutral gray or any brighter color that could vary several shades without turning muddy.

that has nearly nothing to do in this case case, the warping seen can be caused by different factors.

1. only recycled material is used, Recommendation: use some MORE Master Batch (pigment) in order to homogenize the color.
2. screw mixing piece is damaged, either fix it or use another machine (i bet is this one because each part seems to have different Quality).
3. Temperature is set too cold so we have an effect called pumping, that the flow of the material doesnt have the same speed resulting on different colors and wavy look.

EDIT: added word MORE

 

[Kangal]

I have a question. MWeston said he got seven cases. Do all seven cases have the same crack on the hinge?

Since this thread is based on "Opinions" here's mine.
It seems like this Chinese factory/company is screwing with OP.
Is there a more reputable case/mold making company?

I think OP should investigate/ask HP for the company that made their molds for the iPaq h2210.
It was my first PDA, had many others after that.
But none had a case as BEAUTIFUL as the h2210.
It was scratch proof
Didnt leave fingerprints
It was semi-greasy (so smooth but not slippery when you had sweaty hands)
Was very durable (I dropped it many times and very little scratches, no cracks or hardware problems
Was actually quite light.

All in all, it was a marvel and I want the same moulds on my other devices.
Sounds too good? Get a h2210 and feel it.

I've actually bought a few h2210's and just trying to upgrade its internals (a Snapdragon and SGX535 are on top of the list) & add extrabuttons above the screen
Get it to run a Linux. Don't know the distro but if by some miracle UNR gets working I will flip-flop

 

[Nintendo]

It seems like this Chinese factory/company is screwing the OP team.
Is there a more reputable case/mold making company?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neNuyzPe1Rw[/youtube]

 

[shunun]

I'll take mwestons word for the quality and condition of the cases sent and am not about to assume anything which just about everyone in every other thread has made invalidating everything that followed. I just want to point out a pure black, red or any really dark color is rather difficult to obtain consistency on and they might get more acceptable results if they were to settle for a neutral gray or any brighter color that could vary several shades without turning muddy.

that has nearly nothing to do in this case case, the warping seen can be caused by different factors.

1. only recycled material is used, Recommendation: use some Master Batch (pigment) in order to homogenize the color.
2. screw mixing piece is damaged, either fix it or use another machine (i bet is this one because each part seems to have different Quality).
3. Temperature is set too cold so we have an effect called pumping, that the flow of the material doesnt have the same speed resulting on different colors and wavy look.

I think it's time you took a trip to the factory DroneB

 

[Sphinxter]

I'll take mwestons word for the quality and condition of the cases sent and am not about to assume anything which just about everyone in every other thread has made invalidating everything that followed. I just want to point out a pure black, red or any really dark color is rather difficult to obtain consistency on and they might get more acceptable results if they were to settle for a neutral gray or any brighter color that could vary several shades without turning muddy.

that has nearly nothing to do in this case case, the warping seen can be caused by different factors.

1. only recycled material is used, Recommendation: use some Master Batch (pigment) in order to homogenize the color.
2. screw mixing piece is damaged, either fix it or use another machine (i bet is this one because each part seems to have different Quality).
3. Temperature is set too cold so we have an effect called pumping, that the flow of the material doesnt have the same speed resulting on different colors and wavy look.

Nobody said anything about warping. Rebuild the factory, good suggestion, I'm sure that will happen.

 

[droneb]

@sony:
OMG, what the F*ck is your mania with that Vid.

@Shunun:
jaja, maybe just some skype sessions with them might be enough.

@Sphinxter:
maybe i used the wrong words but i know what you meant "the color is uneven"

 

[MWeston]

I have a question. MWeston said he got seven cases. Do all seven cases have the same crack on the hinge?

yes

 

[Consequence_9]

I have a question. MWeston said he got seven cases. Do all seven cases have the same crack on the hinge?

yes

Are you shitting me? That's fucking insulting. They even went as far as saying that you'd thank them for how 'perfect' they were? un-fucking-believable.

 

[droneb]

so it is a crack and not an wave mark?.

im afraid we are facing some serious cooling issues.

btw really if i wish i could help anyway, maybe some info thru direct skype msn qq by voice?

if youre really considering this please mail me or thru boards PM

 

[shunun]

FML!

 

[MWeston]

so it is a crack and not an wave mark?.

im afraid we are facing some serious cooling issues.

btw really if i wish i could help anyway, maybe some info thru direct skype msn qq by voice?

if youre really considering this please mail me or thru boards PM

Along the edge it looks like the plastic cracked off when being ejected and it happens in the same spot on all cases. The holes are from the mechanical tooling blocks that slide in to make the little channels the clips sit inside. They seem to be going too deep and there is almost no plastic left behind them and it collects around the edge while it cools. I don't want to post a million pictures of damaging photos on my Photobucket account but a view from the inside shows the pattern in the plastic these blocks leave in the lid and behind this rounded wall. I read your comments and I agree that the machine used this time around (or the regular guy was out sick?) did not line up the blocks properly or whatever mechanical error could be made.

 

[WizardStan]

I have a question. MWeston said he got seven cases. Do all seven cases have the same crack on the hinge?

yes

That seems like a definite deal breaker to me, then. Visual imperfections are one thing, this is a bloody crack in the case. Why are you even considering going with these?