Rapid Custom Manufacturing

According to years of practical experience and observation for Chinese prototype manufacturing, it was found that most of the exported prototypes were functional models for mechanical verification, few of them were visual ones, some visual prototypes were fabricated and delivered without the desired surface finishing even just the simple painting though it could be done very well in some Chinese prototype factories.

Can Chinese prototype makers not manufacture quality visual prototypes or their surface finishing processes are just limited to simple hand sanding and polishing? Here are part of the visual prototypes with different surface finishing processes applied we have done for customers, hope it could help the readers have a more comprehensive understanding for prototype manufacturing in China.

This two polycarbonate pieces were front cover prototypes of a Bluetooth headset that needed prototype manufacturing for aesthetic verification before its injection tooling fabrication. It was not an easy job to make this two visual cover prototypes at high quality because of its small dimension 52 × 49 × 5 mm and delicate visual design. Different surface finishing processes were applied including: sanding, sandblasting, mirror polishing, color matching, painting, chrome plating, laser engraving and UV coating. Customer was very satisfied with the surface finishing quality we achieved when received the prototypes on time.

Surface finishing processes used for those aluminum prototypes: sanding, anodizing, painting, brushing, silk-screening. Aluminum parts could be anodized and painted in different colors, the anodized thin film provides not only anti-corrosion protection, also the decoration function.

Plastic presentation prototypes with surface finishing processes applied: sanding, mirror polishing, color matching, high gloss and matt painting, laser engraving, UV coating, silk-screening.

Thanks to our solid experience in practice and strong attention to details, we have completed some high quality visual plastic and metal prototypes for worldwide customers, some of them at the beginning don’t believe the Chinese model makers can manufacture such quality presentation prototypes till when they tried us and saw the result.