How to Modify your Enclosure, but Still Save Time & Money
Modifications are often necessary during the enclosure design phase to ensure that your electronic components are properly protected and stabilized. With proper planning and coordination, your product design can be manufactured with your exact customer specifications and requirements.
Identify modification needs early in the design process
The earlier you can identify modification requirements in the design phase, the more often you can take advantage of “stock” enclosures, which will cost substantially less and require less lead time. Consider the following:
- Mounting – are internal or external mounting provisions required? We can add tapped holes or preassemble mounting brackets
- Shielding – add EMI/ RFI shielding to enclosures
- Accessibility – who will need to be able to access the internal components for maintenance? also consider security
In addition to features, consider your realistic quantity for the lifetime of your program. Do you have a continuity plan? Are you developing to grow to an ultimate quantity over time?
Our best advice: keep the design simple. Remove anything that doesn’t serve a specific purpose and try to minimize the number of fasteners. Keep things like thread size and fastener type the same across your design in order to bring the cost of your design down as much as possible.
Source the proper supplier
Look for suppliers that have invested in tooling, can produce modifications rapidly and are equipped to accept customer-generated CAD files. You’re the expert in your electronic products and understanding what can be modified and to what tolerance, but leveraging the manufacturability expertise of your supplier can quickly, efficiently and cost-effectively give you the enclosure you’re looking for.
Our tooling investments means no more measuring, drilling or cutting in-house so that you can focus your attentions on other segments of your operations and programs. You’ll get repeatable cutout accuracy, increased safety by eliminating manual power tools, cut any shape or size and drawings can be stored for future needs in our ERP system.
Take advantage of our services
A&J can provide design recommendations for customers who don’t / can’t do their own, and can quickly offer alternative layouts using our Design Engineering services. We’ll figure out how to accommodate unique designs using standard product to keep your required features and still keep the price low. Try to provide as much detail as possible since most design services are priced hourly. The less time a design engineer is using to research, design, modify and redesign, the lower your overall cost will be.
And we can preassemble additional enclosure components, including cable and mounting brackets, access panels, shelves, fans, vents or other accessories.
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We have an experienced design engineering services team that is knowledgeable, available and capable.