Steel cost. Machining hours. Polish hours. Inserts. Trial shots. Where every dollar of mold tooling goes, with real shop numbers.
The headline cost categories
A $80,000 single-cavity production mold (P20 steel, 100K-shot life, SPI A2 polish on the cavity, side action for one undercut) breaks down approximately as: tool steel $5K, CNC roughing $15K, EDM finishing $14K, hand polishing $10K, side-action mechanism $9K, ejector system $6K, hot runner $12K, trial shots and tuning $9K. Total $80K. Different molds shift these numbers, but those proportions are typical.
What you can change
Hot runner adds $10-25K but eliminates runner waste and shortens cycle time — pays back above 50K shots. Multi-cavity adds 60-80% to cost for double the throughput — pays back above 100K shots per year. Hardened steel (H13) adds 30% over P20 but lasts 5× longer — pays back above 500K total shots. Polish level: SPI A1 mirror is 2× the cost of A3 satin. Most cosmetic parts are fine with A2.
Side actions and lifters add $5-15K each and pay back essentially never on cost — they exist because the geometry has undercuts. Cheapest fix is to redesign the part to avoid them.
When to skip the steel mold entirely
Aluminum bridge tooling at $12-25K gets you 5-10K shots in 2-4 weeks. For pre-launch validation, market testing, or any volume below 5K parts/year, aluminum tooling is the right answer. We see customers spend $80K on steel tooling for products that ship 3K units total — that money should have stayed in their bank.
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