These Pip-Boys, like many products that are made of plastic, are produced by injection molding. Injection molding is shaping plastic or rubber by forcing the heated material into a mold. Each Pip-Boy is made up of 121 injection molded parts. These are molded in 21 large, hardened stainless steel tools each weighing as much as half a ton.
Both halves of the holotape player tool.
Both halves of the screen bezel family tool.
Despite their size and bulk, these tools are very expensive and highly complex pieces of engineering and have to be machined to an extremely high degree of accuracy, so that both halves (the core and the cavity) fit together perfectly.
To make a part, the tools are fitted to an injection molding machine that can push them together with an enormous force of 100 to 200 tons, so that 230˚C (446˚F), water-thin, molten plastic squirted into the mold cavity under high pressure does not leak out at the joins between the two halves of the tool and cause unsightly flash in the finished component. Flashing is the excess plastic on items where it has leaked out during the injection process. This is shaved or grinded off to produce a smooth finish.
Composite image showing newly molded holotape components
The image above shows a newly molded holotape components as it is ejected from the tool, before the runners and sprues (parts caused by the channels in the tool that feed the molded plastic to the tool cavities) have been removed. The runners and sprues are ground up and recycled to make more parts.
Once the parts have been molded, they are combined with a further 150 springs, screws, electrical components and stamped metal parts and assembled largely by hand to create each Pip-Boy.
Images shown above are concept rendering only. Final Product may vary
Expected Release Date: March 2023 (subject to change)
Retail price: $180.00
Vault-Tec™ variant: 2,200 units
Sugar Bombs variant: 1,300 units
Enclave variant: 1,500 units
Each month leading up to the release date, we’ll be releasing updates on these Pip-Boys. To be notified of these updates, enter your email below and tell us which Pip-Boys you’re most interested in.