Custom mould base
Machined to your drawing — plate list, pocket layout, bores and threads to your own tolerances.
Mould base
Custom mould base manufacturer
Mould base or mold base — the same part, spelled two ways. Buyers in the UK, Australia, India, Singapore and Malaysia usually write mould base; buyers in the United States write mold base. We machine both from the same drawing, in Dongguan, China.
What a mould base actually does
A mould base — also called a mould frame, mould shoe or mould stand — is the steel stack that carries everything else. The cavity and core inserts sit in its pockets, the guide pillars and bushes keep the two halves aligned, the ejector plate pushes the part out, and the cooling circuit runs through its plates. It also takes the clamping load on the press, which is why the flatness of the backing faces matters more than most drawings admit.
Because it is the datum for the whole tool, the numbers that decide whether a mould base is good are the ones nobody photographs: parallelism between plates, squareness of the stack, bore position for the pillars and bushes, and the surface finish on the faces that actually shut off.
What we machine
Fourteen product families in total. These are the ones buyers ask for by the name mould base.
Injection mould base
Single-material and family mould frames with the ejector, cooling and slide space already allowed for.
Standard mould base
Catalogue-pattern frames in S50C and P20, cut from stock and shipped without a drawing review.
Die casting mould frame
Heavier frames for aluminium and zinc dies, with the clamping and thermal load allowed for.
Complete mould build
Not just the base — cavity and core inserts, ejector system, assembly and spotting.
Two-colour mould base
Two-station frames where the rotating or sliding half has to line up to the same datum.
Mould base specification
Steel grades we hold
- S50C (1.1730)
- P20 (1.2311 / 1.2312)
- Forged P20
- 718
- 718H
- 738
- 738H
- 4Cr13
- 420H
- S136H
- H13 (1.2344)
- 1.2711 (54NiCrMoV6)
If your drawing names a grade we do not list, send it anyway — we will tell you plainly whether it is available.
What we hold on the finished part
- ±0.02 mm on fitting and ground faces, including parallelism and squareness
- ±0.02 mm position on guide pillar and guide bush bores
- Ra 0.8 µm on ground faces; 0.3 mm on non-fitting faces
- Plates above 600 mm are agreed piece by piece before the first cut
Lead time, capacity and inspection
7–10 day lead time is typical for a mould base cut to a complete drawing. Plates that need roughing before finishing, or a stack with several heat-treat steps, are quoted with their own dates — we would rather give you a real date than a fast one.
We run 2,000+ sets per month across a 2,000 m² plant with 50+ staff on two shifts, which is what makes a repeat order behave like the first one.
Every mould base is measured on a CMM before dispatch, and the inspection record travels in the crate with the part. If you need the record before the crate leaves, say so on the order and we will send the scan ahead of shipment.
1 set MOQ, factory direct. Payment is 50% deposit and 50% before shipment.
The spelling question, settled
Mould base, mold base, mould frame, mold frame, mould shoe, mould stand, mould holder — all of them describe the same assembly, and none of them is wrong. Mould is the spelling used in British English and in most of the markets we ship to; mold is the American form. Chinese, Japanese and Korean drawings often use a third convention entirely and are translated either way on arrival.
So send your drawing as it is written. You do not need to translate the title block, convert the tolerance convention, or rewrite “mould base” into “mold base” before asking for a price. We read both, and we quote against the drawing you actually work from.
Send a drawing for pricing How we inspect →
Buying a Chinese mould base rather than a domestic one? What buying a mold base from China actually involves — what the price covers, how 7–10 days works, and how to check a supplier before the first order.