Star puts its finger on the perfect solution

Photo: Star performance - the finger vein biometric door access protoype produced by Star Prototype

Dec 2011

Star Prototype has demonstrated the scope of its capabilities by delivering a functional prototype using a process that included vacuum casting, CNC machined plastic, sheet metal, silk screening, vapour polishing, painting and engraving.

The Chinese company, which is owned by Teesside businessman, Gordon Styles, was called in to deliver a prototype of a finger vein biometric door access solution for a Canadian company that needed photorealistic and yet functional prototypes.

"The client provided us with a specification of what was required and the materials they wanted to use and we then developed a solution that we felt best suited their requirements," explained Gordon Styles.

"The scope of our service is such that we were able to go back with a proposal that utilised materials we felt were better suited to certain elements of the design and incorporate a variety of different processes that enhanced the final quality of the prototype."

The vacuum casted parts of the prototype were made with two different types of polyurethane - UP4280 and UPX8400 from Axson. The first of which is similar to ABS and the latter, rubber.  The dark grey castings were cast in the correct colour and picked up the texture from the mould - this is very unusual for China, but quite common in Europe.  The light silver parts were painted.

The pads were also made out of polycarbonate.  At first PMMA was considered, but this would have required a lot of manual sanding and the parts were too small for this to be realistic.  Instead the parts were made from PC and polished using our vapour polishing technology. This highly dangerous and extremely effective process dates back to World War 2 and the need to make Spitfire cockpit canopies clear again after repairs.

They keypads were vacuum cast in blue tinted PX522HT UV stable PU resin and then painted.  After painting, the letters were laser engraved into the surface allowing light to pass through, in a similar fashion to production key manufacture.

Client: Star Prototype