A Simple Innovation: Illuminating the Inside of the Mold

During press manufacturing, the inside of the mold is often too dark under standard factory lighting alone. This makes it difficult to monitor critical areas, such as material feeding, part ejection, and scrap accumulation.

To solve this, HIROTA mounted LED lights directly to the molds rather than the press machines.

While the mechanism is simple, it is a highly practical improvement that reliably illuminates the exact areas where light is needed most.

Reason for Mounting Directly to the Mold

When lighting is installed on the press machine itself, shadows can form depending on the shape and positioning of the mold, or the light may fail to reach the necessary areas.

If only one light is to be installed, it is far more effective to illuminate the inside of the mold directly—the very spot that requires monitoring—rather than trying to light up the entire press machine.

By mounting the light onto the mold, operators can easily inspect the internal status from a safe position while the press is in operation.

This significantly improves the visibility of material feeding, part ejection, and residual scrap, allowing for the early detection of any abnormalities.

Illuminating Only Where Needed at Night

At Hirota Precision, we utilize nighttime unattended machining. During night operations, we can maintain the ideal brightness inside the mold without having to keep the entire factory floor or the area surrounding the press machine fully lit.

This also eliminates the need to prepare flashlights or mobile lighting fixtures every time an inspection is performed.

Focusing limited lighting exactly where it matters most, and installing it directly at the source—this simple yet effective approach makes the solution easy to implement while delivering highly impactful results for our daily operations.