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You could overmold the grip in place. Some punched holes in the pole would make great keys to lock the grip and deal with your ‘tightness’ issue fully.

[Martin Turner]

Hello!  I’m designing lightweight hiking poles and need to attach a plastic grip sleeve to an aluminum tube core. The grip has to stay super straight and centered along the pole for good balance and comfort. Has anyone worked with ABS or Polycarbonate for something like this? I’m curious about the kind of linearity and concentricity tolerances I can expect, especially after machining or any post-processing. Thanks.

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[Vincent D]

Hi, I’ve worked with similar situations before – bike bar-grips. First I’d suggest you aim for no post-mold machining. That’s a big expense and it should be possible to design the need out. Second the linearity and concentricity issues. Are there any alignment features on the Aluminum pole? I presume it’s extruded and then machined, so you could punch a notch into the end of the aluminum as an alignment and anti-rotation feature.

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[Alan Teh]

You could overmold the grip in place. Some punched holes in the pole would make great keys to lock the grip and deal with your ‘tightness’ issue fully.

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[Vincent D]

Agreed, though it’s difficult to align the pole to the overmold tool, so if there’s a critical alignment issue that’s a harder choice. And the cost saving in overmolding only shows up if the volume is high, because the overmold tool is by nature more expensive than a basic mold.

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