Expertise
Where plastic parts fail, we’ve already been.
Our practice areas map one-to-one onto the failure modes that end programs: the snap that cracks, the stack-up that won’t close, the resin that creeps, the part that won’t mold. Pick your problem below.
Practice areas
Six failure modes. Six practices built around them.
Each practice area is taught in the seminars, encoded in ChatETS and available as a senior-engineer engagement.
Snap-fit & fastening
Cantilever, annular and torsional snaps; screw bosses, inserts, press-fits and welding. Retention force, assembly strain and what happens after 1,000 cycles.
- Strain-limited arm design
- Boss root & thread design
- Joining method selection
Tolerance stack-up
Assemblies that close on paper and gap in the vehicle. Shrink, warp and thermal expansion folded into the stack before it becomes a squeak, rattle or leak.
- Shrink & warp allowance
- CTE mismatch
- Datum strategy
Creep, fatigue & ESC
The time-dependent failures a short-term test misses: parts that relax, crack under chemicals, or fatigue under vibration long after PPAP.
- Long-term load design
- Chemical exposure risk
- Cyclic loading
Moldability & tooling risk
Wall, draft, ribs, gates and undercuts reviewed against what the mold will actually do, before slides, lifters or a re-cut are needed.
- Gate & weld-line placement
- Undercut strategy
- Sink & void prevention
Supplier & process risk
When the part was right but the supply chain changed: resin substitutions, process drift and quality escapes traced to cause.
- Material substitution review
- Process-window audit
- Quality-escape analysis
Corrective action
Containment and permanent fixes your team can execute, documented well enough to close the 8D and defend in a dispute.
- Root-cause documentation
- Containment plans
- Design change validation
Tolerances, creep and chemistry don’t care how good the CAD looked.
Related resources
Go straight to the source.
The textbook, the author, and the free checklist that starts every ETS design review.
Designing Plastic Parts for Assembly
10th edition, Carl Hanser. The reference the seminars are taught from.
Read the forewords →Paul A. Tres
SPE Fellow, lecturer at universities across the US, author and expert witness.
Speaker profile →Pre-tooling risk checklist
The same questions a senior engineer asks before a design review.
Get the checklist →Next step
Name the failure mode. We’ll name the fix.
Describe the part and the symptom. A senior engineer replies within one business day.
- NDA on request
- Senior engineer replies in one business day
- Fixed price where applicable
- Your data stays yours