Mercury Plastics of the U.S. has developed a patented hybrid fabrication technology to produce complex parts. The technology called Air-Core Molding (ACM) mimics in some ways deep-draw, three-dimensional blow-molding and is comparable to this and other competing processes in it's ability to enhance part design and remain cost competitive. This is especially so when the technique is used to make parts that are long and convoluted in specific areas of the profile. According to the company, ACM allows multi-angled, multi-dimensional and corrugated sections to be fabricated into ready-to-ship components at relatively low cost. ACM begins with the extrusion of a straight, single-layer or multi-layer tube made of polyolefin (PP or PE) or other material. Wall thickness of the profile is extremely uniform and tubes can be crosslinked. In the second step, the tube is then reheated and hand or robot positioned in a special apparatus or jig. This jig, currently built by Mercury, consists of a special blow mold captured in a frame that is designed to open and close the mold, and allow the introduction of air. After mold closure, low pressure (0.5-2kg/cm2) is applied inside the part using air introduced through protruding tube ends. This molds the tube, which in effect, has become the parison, into a designated shape or to a new plane or angle.The whole tube, or selected section of it, can be shaped or twisted in this way, to incorporate corrugations. According to Mercury, the gentle process creates minimal flash, requires little or no trimming and generates minimal scrap. The process also eliminates knit lines, retains the high uniformity of the tube's wall thickness in parts, and provides surface and gloss properties of a higher quality than blow moulding. In addition to this tooling costs are reduced when a rapid modification of design is needed as with model changes. Production scheduling is said to be highly flexible as a result of minimal set up times, (to change colour, or restart production), generally a maximum of one hour.