I have a unique design for a small moulded boat and I am trying to find a company that can give me a quote, an approximate price to make a prototype and then additional production units. I live in Southern Ontario, Canada
Western Canoe and Kayak in
Abbotsford, British Columbia manufactures canoes including voyageur. Not sure if this helps.
Don’t forget to patent it first…
…not sayin’ the companies are dishonest but avoid any possible legal issues from the get go…ya know?
Pastitech
Spelling may be off. They are in North Bay Ontario. They do small kayaks and paddleboats. I only know of them by name.
How about
E-mailing Tom Strauss At Emotion kayaks.
He has a good company without all the overlap of the big corperations like Johnson.
Ok, first, second steps
– Last Updated: Nov-20-09 9:46 AM EST –
Initially, you need to have a stripper built. There should be lots of folks around who can do that @ ~$2K CAD! Glassed inside and out, it can be paddled/tested.
If you like the hull, develop a confidentiality agreement before approaching manufacturers.
Assuming a roto molded hull, and an Ontario/Quebec location, I guess I'd show the thing to Riot first. A nickle/CAD mold will cost ~ $80K, and that plugs into a $250k machine, so be realistic about what you've put in and what the mfg will have invested.
Tooling your plug and building a mold for a composite hull can be achieved for $5K if you do your own work.
A vacuum forming mold for ABS hulls is a little more expensive and you'll be limited to manufacturers with an oven and a significant vacuum system.
Good luck!
charlie
Not sure what molded means, but Red
Red River Canoe & Paddle has done composite prototyping.
http://www.redrivercanoe.ca/composites.htm
If you mean rotomolded, I am afeared of what kind of price would be involved. Composites can be done on a small scale, but rotomolded plastic is more of an industrial scale operation. CEW’s post above is a good wake up call if you’re talking rotomolded products.
I think you’ll get better answers if you describe exactly what you mean by “molded,” since both plastic and composite boats are molded.
yea, a stripper
You may want to post here.
http://www.kayakforum.com/cgi-bin/Building/index.cgi
or build a striper yourself. I assume you designed this in a nautical design program that can show stations? But going from a wood prototype to a mold for plastic production is expensive and there is no such thing as a one of a kind for cheap. Even a fast wood strip job would cost around $2000. minimum if somebody knocks it out without any care of artistry.
then show it to a kayak company and see where it goes. Kayak companys really don’t need more models unless it absolutely fantastic.
Good luck.
Stripper
I believe a stripper would be your best bet. Need the profile for some forms then strip away…