Reviving Moldmaking Through Hands-On Mastery

The moldmaking industry has been facing a crisis. After decades of specialization, outsourcing and stagnant wages, the nation has lost much of its moldmaking expertise, deep knowledge and craftsmanship. But there’s growing awareness of the need to bring that craftsmanship back and renewed efforts to pass those skills on to the next generation. At Penn State Behrend, educators and industry veterans are working to reverse this trend by teaching the next generation not just how to run machines, but how to think, troubleshoot and respect the trade.  This school is tackling the skilled labor shortage through hands-on training, experienced instructors, cutting-edge equipment and strategic partnerships.

"Everybody's dying for toolmakers, but we've lost the art of what moldmaking is," explains Andrew Bartlett , a veteran toolmaker with nearly 40 years in the trade who works as both a toolmaker and teaching assistant at Behrend. The problem isn't just about filling positions; it's about rebuilding an entire knowledge base that has been systematically dismantled.

Building Knowledge from the Ground Up

Penn State Behrend's approach recognizes moldmaking as a sophisticated craft that requires theoretical knowledge, hands-on experience, problem-solving skills and mentorship from masters of the trade. The heart of Behrend's initiative is its instructors, who are seasoned professionals with decades of real-world experience. Bartlett spent 30 years at a local tool shop as a toolmaker and toolroom manager, often working 60–70-hour weeks, building a mold every week and contributing to $40 million in production during his final year. He nearly burned out before finding his calling at Behrend.

"I went to my doctor, and he said, 'The stress that you're under, you've got one more year left,'" Bartlett recalls. By fortune, he ended up at Penn State Behrend, where he could channel his extensive knowledge into training the next generation.

He's joined by Chris Bartlett, who together represent over 70 years of combined experience. Chris, at 40, represents a younger generation of toolmakers who deliberately avoided becoming pigeonholed into a single specialty, which is rare in an industry that transitioned to departmentalization over the years.

Hands-on Learning

Behrend's program includes a fully functional tool shop where students solve real problems. When a plastics engineering technology student encounters an issue during a capstone project, they bring the mold and molded parts down to investigate. The instructors perform "autopsies" on molds with students, examining what the steel reveals and working through problem-solving strategies.

"We'll look at the mold, see what the steel is showing and then work with them on how to problem solve," Bartlett says. "It's not instinct. Moldmaking doesn't work that way."

The program includes a tool design and machining class where students build inserts for Lego-like parts. They learn to read prints, understand steel properties, know proper fits and tolerances and select appropriate materials.

"We'll look at the mold, see what the steel is showing and then work with them on how to problem solve," Bartlett says. "It's not instinct. Moldmaking doesn't work that way."

Strategic Partnerships

One of Behrend's most significant recent initiatives is the America's Cutting Edge (ACE) program, funded by the Department of Defense. Recognizing that America has "gutted manufacturing so badly" that national security is at risk during wartime, the DoD invested millions to revitalize manufacturing education.

The ACE program offers completely free 40-hour boot camps where students work alongside instructors, including Andy and Chris, with years of combined experience. Participants who have never touched a machine on Monday morning can run a CNC machine by Friday.

The program's success has been remarkable, with 80% of first-year participants coming from Behrend's engineering programs. Students increasingly recognize that pairing theoretical engineering education with hands-on machining skills creates graduates who are immediately valuable to industry. A condition of receiving equipment and funding was enrolling at least 75 students in the first year, which is a target that Behrend exceeded.

Complementing ACE is the METAL program, covering casting, forging and metallurgy. Behrend is installing a 16-ton power forge for blacksmith forging, along with a foundry capable of pouring aluminum and bronze.

A mechanical engineering student with a two-year degree in blacksmithing spent a summer working with Andy and Chris. By summer's end, he built forge dies, electrodes and complete assemblies, all while teaching Andy and Chris blacksmithing in return.

Equipment and Facilities

Behrend's commitment to preparing moldmaking professionals is evident in its equipment, built through DoD funding, industry donations and institutional support.

The facility includes multiple CNC mills, including five-axis machines, lathes with live tooling, wire EDMs, sinker EDMs and traditional Bridgeports. While some people might question why Bridgeports remain relevant in the CNC era, Behrend understands their educational value. "That's where you learn how a mill works," Bartlett says.

Quality control education includes the full spectrum of measurement technology, from traditional calipers and micrometers through CMMs to an $80,000 Keyence system equipped with probe, laser and optical capabilities. Students learn to work to tolerances within a tenth of a thousandth of an inch.

All welding stations were donated by Lincoln Electric, which recognized the value of supporting workforce development. The school is pursuing laser welding capabilities to help teach students to fix mistakes rather than scrapping expensive components.

The success of the tooling area depends partly on its relationship with the plastics engineering technology program, where students can observe how their precision work translates to production efficiency and part quality. Behrend’s plastics lab houses a variety of molding equipment giving students the opportunity to understand different molding technologies and their applications. The lab features both horizontal and vertical machines, including a vertical unit donated by GM specifically for insert molding applications. One particularly advanced machine includes two injection units, designed for two-shot molding capabilities. Currently, a project is underway to convert it into a co-injection machine, with students developing special apparatus where multiple materials can be combined.

Several machines are equipped with robots, providing students with exposure to automation integration. "Running a robot isn't so much the challenge, because they pick that up pretty quickly," Engineering Lecturer and Plastics Training Director Brad Johnson says though he emphasizes that "designing automation cells would be good" as a future curriculum addition.

The program also maintains specialized equipment for testing and quality control. Students use molding machines to produce test bars that are then analyzed for physical properties in the material testing lab. The facility includes temperature control chambers for testing materials under various environmental conditions, viscosity measurement equipment and a QUV (ultraviolet light) chamber for long-term environmental testing.

Much of the equipment in the plastics lab has been acquired through industry partnerships and consignment arrangements with manufacturers. When equipment requires maintenance, the consignment arrangements typically include manufacturer support. "When they break, they usually fix them for free," making the partnerships valuable not just for access to equipment, but for ongoing technical support that benefits both students and the program.

The Mold Designer Shortage

While moldmaker shortages receive significant attention, the mold designer crisis may be even more severe. "There's even less people going into mold design," notes Bartlett.

Behrend’s plastic engineering technology program currently offers a two-credit-hour tool design and machining class, with plans to expand with technical electives. The goal is to help engineering students understand mold design principles and communicate effectively with moldmakers. "We're getting them to learn how to talk to moldmakers," Bartlett says. "Understanding the features that they need to think about when they're designing. That cross-training really helps get them ready for real world work."

Throughout the conversation, one theme repeatedly emerges: the industry must pay skilled workers appropriately or continue losing talent.

The statistics are troubling. Many shops pay only $25 per hour for skilled craftsmen with years of expertise, while plumbers command $50 per hour. When Bartlett started in the trade, top moldmakers earned $18 per hour; after 30 years, that rate had only climbed to $25, a mere $7 increase over three decades.

"Companies need to realize they're going to have to pay people," Barlett says.

A moldmaker with four or five years of experience and 10,000 hours who can build a complete mold deserves far more than $25 per hour. The same applies to mold designers. A designer who can create an entire half-million-dollar mold in 100 hours should command $150,000 annually, he argues. Yet many companies pay designers $40,000-50,000 while wondering why they can't fill positions.

When Behrend's plastics engineering technology program first started, local companies helped fund it but initially refused to hire graduates at competitive wages. "None of them would work locally because they weren't paying them enough," the instructor recalls. "So, they had to learn the lesson."

Creating a Culture Shift

Beyond wages, Behrend is working to restore what the instructor calls the "nobility" of moldmaking, recognizing it as the sophisticated art form it truly is.

The school focuses on encouraging creative thinking and making sure students get the big picture instead of just drilling down on one specific thing. Rather than creating machine operators who can only perform one task, Behrend develops well-rounded professionals who understand the entire moldmaking process.

This philosophy extends beyond moldmaking. One ME student who took the ACE program later worked as a systems engineer in New York City. "She said the things I learned in ACE, I actually used in the process," Bartlett shares. "She didn't realize that in manufacturing, everything is contingent on everything else."

That interconnected thinking, understanding how design decisions impact manufacturing and how manufacturing capabilities influence design is precisely what industry needs.

The most convincing argument for supporting programs like Behrend's comes from the Department of Defense's recognition that American manufacturing capacity is a national security issue.

"They're realizing, 'My gosh, we've gutted manufacturing so badly, if we have a war we're in trouble,'" Bartlett says. The ACE program even includes a LinkedIn badge that participants can add to their profiles; not just for career networking, but so the government knows where qualified manufacturing workers are located in case of national emergency.

During COVID-19, this reality became visible when everything from respirator masks to coffee creamer required moldmakers working through lockdowns as "essential workers." Without domestic manufacturing capability and the skilled workers to support it, America's economic and strategic independence is at risk.

The program's success has been remarkable, with 80% of first-year participants coming from Behrend's engineering programs.

A Blueprint Worth Replicating

Penn State Behrend's approach to addressing the moldmaking skills gap offers valuable lessons:

• Hiring instructors and toolmakers with decades of real-world moldmaking experience provides students with practical wisdom that textbooks cannot teach.
• Students need to solve real problems and build actual molds; not just study theory.
• Government funding, industry donations and institutional support create resources no single entity could provide alone.
• The ACE program's complete tuition waiver ensures that financial constraints don't prevent motivated students from gaining skills.
• Teaching the complete process creates more valuable professionals than narrow specialists.
• All the training in the world won't solve the skills gap if the industry refuses to compensate skilled workers fairly.

Penn State Behrend is building the workforce, preserving the knowledge and demonstrating what's possible when education and industry work together. They are fighting to make that future a reality, one student, one mold, one skilled worker at a time.