Latest articles

Balance is important when you’re CNC machining parts —  you can break things if your balance is off. Balancing tools for CNC machinery, or “tool balancing”: This article will discuss how tool balancing works, its process, the common tool balancing standards, the importance of tool balancing, and the considerations to take. Why Should You Balance […]

Is prototype injection molding an oxymoron? If you’re like most designers, you’ve learned that plastic injection molding is for high volumes of production-quality (i.e., non-prototype) parts. Maybe you’ve also heard that steel injection molds are for higher volumes, aluminum injection molds are for lower volumes, and that both types of molds are too expensive for […]

Injection molding is a multi-step process that injects molten plastic into a metal tool called a mold. The plastic material then cools into a solid and the part is ejected. This process is easy to understand, but part designers, mold makers, and injection molders all need to speak the same language. Fictiv’s Injection Molding Glossary […]

Without access to advanced manufacturing equipment and computer programming, civilization as we know it would not exist. Would we have nice things? Sure. But would we have traveled to the moon and outer space and explored the deep depths of the ocean? Likely not at the scale we are able to today. We have CNC […]

We live in a world where we expect everything to be fast. Cars move fast. We get our food in a drive-thru. Everyone needs everything right now. This demand for speed extends to every aspect of life, including your profession, where you likely are under pressure to source high-quality parts at rapid speeds. I have […]

It’s usually not the most organized, clean, or well-lit area in a machine shop, but it is critical in supporting machining operations. In manufacturing facilities equipped with them, the toolroom is a designated space that engineers and expert machinists use to create and maintain tooling. This area is typically separate from the main production floor […]

In manufacturing, low-volume production comes with unique challenges for businesses looking to improve processes and reduce overall costs. Compared to high-volume production, low-volume production involves smaller batch sizes, which can lead to higher costs per unit. You may be tasked with budget control, cost-cutting, or cost-effective low-volume production as an engineer. Or, you may be […]

At Fictiv, we’re constantly looking for new ways to do two very important things:  So we’re thrilled to share that we’ve just done BOTH — again! What to know: We’ve improved our quoting and pricing algorithm for high-quantity part orders, specifically CNC aluminum and Delrin orders in quantities greater than 11. Why it matters: Now […]

Over the last few years, there’s been significant progress in the fields of robotics and artificial intelligence. While Robotics-as-a-Service (RaaS) has boomed in the past decade thanks to fresh financing models, broader adoption of industrial robots remains elusive. While demand exists, many RaaS providers have found it challenging to deploy robotics effectively for real-world tasks […]

San Francisco, July 11, 2023 – Fictiv today announced a major milestone on its path to becoming the world’s operating system for custom manufacturing with the opening of its India-based headquarters in Bengaluru. After an initial launch in Pune and positive feedback from its customer base on the advantages provided by the region, the company is formalizing its investment in […]