Where the tool, the machine and the cycle time decide whether the job makes money.
Early accessCubeERP for plastics & rubber moulding
ERP for moulders and extruders - tooling, cycle times, cavity counts, regrind and machine data from the shop floor.
- Plastics
- UK hosted, implemented on site
- 01234 672 617
In moulding, cost is dominated by machine time and tooling rather than labour, and a cycle time assumption that is two seconds out becomes a large number over a production run.
CubeERP models tools, cavities and cycle times explicitly, schedules by machine and tool availability, captures actual cycles and scrap from the floor, and tracks regrind as real material rather than as something that disappears.
- Actual
Cycle times against quoted
- By shot
Tool maintenance on real usage
- Recorded
Regrind ratio, per batch
What goes wrong
The recurring problems in plastics
Not every business has all five. Almost every business we speak to has three.
Cycle times taken from the quote
Estimated cycle times are never compared with actual. A small difference across a long run is a large amount of machine time nobody has costed.
Tooling tracked informally
Tool location, cavity count, shot count and maintenance history live in a spreadsheet or a head. Tools are found late and maintained reactively.
Regrind that vanishes
Regrind is generated, stored and reused without record. Material accounting does not balance and the permitted regrind ratio is impossible to evidence.
Machine selection by habit
Jobs run on the machine they always run on, not the one that suits them, because tool-to-machine compatibility is not held anywhere.
Scrap counted at the end
Scrap is reconciled at job close rather than booked at the machine, so the cause is gone by the time the number appears.
What we do about it
How CubeERP is set up for plastics
Configuration, not a separate edition. Everything here is in the same product - it is switched on and shaped during implementation.
Tools, cavities and cycles
Tool records with cavity counts, cycle times, machine compatibility, shot counts and maintenance schedules driven by usage rather than the calendar.
Scheduling by machine and tool
Works orders scheduled against machine tonnage, tool availability and material changeover, with sequencing to cut colour and material changes.
Shop-floor and machine data
Actual cycles, good parts, scrap and downtime captured at the machine - by operator or straight from the machine via the API.
Regrind as real material
Regrind booked into stock, blended into batches at a recorded ratio, and traceable - so material accounting balances and the ratio is evidenced.
Cost by machine hour
Machine-hour rates by tonnage and cell, with actual versus quoted cycle time reported per job so estimating improves from evidence.
Batch traceability
Material lot, regrind ratio, tool and machine traced into every production batch, with certificates carried through to despatch.
In practice
Two situations from this sector
Anonymised, but not invented. These are the situations businesses describe before they change anything.
Two seconds a shot
The situation
A moulder quoted on estimated cycle times. On several long-running parts the actual cycle was around two seconds longer, and over a year that was a substantial amount of unquoted machine time.
What changed
Actual cycles are captured at the machine and compared with the quote. Estimates were corrected, and two tools were reworked because the payback was now provable.
A tool that failed mid-run
The situation
Tool maintenance was scheduled by date. A high-usage tool passed its real service interval well before its calendar date and failed during a production run.
What changed
Maintenance is triggered by shot count. Unplanned tool failures fell, and the maintenance schedule now reflects how hard each tool actually works.
How it happens
What implementation involves
The same five stages whatever you make. Discovery, training and go-live are done on your site, because most of what the system needs to know is learned in the building.
- 1
Discovery
A structured session mapping how you work now - the systems, the spreadsheets and the bits held together by one person’s memory. We come back with what the platform covers as standard, what needs configuration, and what needs building.
- 2
Configuration
Your sites, warehouses, price lists, approval limits, document templates, workflows and permissions set up to match the business - not a demo tenant with your logo dropped on it.
- 3
Data migration
Customers, suppliers, parts, bills of materials, price lists, open orders and stock balances brought across and reconciled. We migrate, you check the numbers against the old system, and only then do we cut over.
- 4
Training & rollout
Role-based training so the order desk learns the order desk and the warehouse learns the warehouse, with a pilot group first where it makes sense. Documentation and short screen recordings left behind for new starters.
- 5
Ongoing support
UK support from the people who built the platform, with a named contact, agreed response times, and a product roadmap you can influence.
Questions
What this sector asks first
Yes. Tool ownership, location, condition and shot count are recorded regardless of whose asset it is, which matters when a customer asks for their tool back.
Yes, via the API. Cycle counts, good parts, scrap and downtime can be posted directly from machine or MES systems rather than entered by an operator.
Regrind is stocked and valued, and its inclusion ratio is recorded per batch, so material cost reflects the actual blend rather than assuming virgin material throughout.
Yes. Sequencing rules group by material and colour to reduce purge and changeover, which on a busy cell is usually worth more than any other scheduling gain.
Yes - assembly, decoration, printing and packing are routing operations after moulding, including sub-contract steps, on the same works order.
Where to start
The parts that usually matter most here
Manufacturing Software
Bills of materials, works orders, routings, shop-floor booking and real job costing - for businesses that make things to order.
Read moreProduction Planning Software
Schedule works orders against real capacity - people, machines and shifts - and see the effect of a rush job before you accept it.
Read moreJob Costing Software
Know what every job actually cost - materials, labour, sub-contract and overhead - while it is running, not six weeks later.
Read moreBarcode & Traceability Software
Batch and serial traceability from goods-in to despatch, with certificates attached and a recall answered in minutes.
Read more
Related
Sectors with similar problems
- Engineering & FabricationERP for subcontract machinists, fabricators and engineering firms working to drawing, to order and to a promised date.
- Automotive & Vehicle PartsERP for automotive suppliers and parts distributors - schedules and call-offs, EDI, traceability and delivery performance that is measured.
- Chemicals, Coatings & Formulated ProductsERP for formulators and blenders - recipes, batch traceability, yields, hazardous stock and compliance documentation.
If your process really is unusual
Some requirements are specific to one business rather than one sector. Those get built against the same documented API everybody else uses - not bolted on to the side of a database nobody is allowed to look at.
Plastics
Show us a real job from your plastics operation
Bring one order that went wrong and the paperwork that went with it. That tells us more about whether this fits than any list of features.