Paperless Molding Tickets

This topic is part of the SG Systems Global plastics, injection molding and discrete manufacturing control glossary.

Updated December 2025 • Digital Work Orders, Operator Guidance, Real-Time Traceability • Plastic & Resin, Automotive, Medical Devices, Consumer Products

Paperless molding tickets replace traditional paper job tickets on injection molding presses with digital work instructions, parameters and sign-offs managed in a MES (Manufacturing Execution System). Instead of hand-written scrap tallies and illegible notes taped to the machine, operators see controlled instructions, approved setpoints and electronic operator sign-offs on-screen. Every shot, lot and change is recorded into an integrated batch ticket, eBMR or DHR rather than disappearing into a clipboard that nobody can find during an audit.

“If your molding tickets are still carbon-copy pads hanging from the press, your best process data is literally walking out of the door with the shift change.”

1) What Are Paperless Molding Tickets?

Paperless molding tickets are the electronic equivalent of the traditional “job traveler” at the molding press. A typical paper ticket historically combined:

• Basic job details – part number, color, cavity, tool number, target quantity.
• Material and lot information – resin, masterbatch, regrind limits.
• Process parameters – temperatures, pressures, times, clamp force, cooling.
• Scrap and deviation notes – handwritten reject counts and comments.
• Signatures – for start-up, in-process checks and final release.

In a paperless setup, all of this information is driven by master data and production scheduling, presented on the press HMI or terminal, and written back to a central database. The “ticket” becomes a controlled record in the system rather than a physical piece of paper.

2) Why Paperless Molding Tickets Matter in Plastics & Resin

Injection molding plants that still rely on paper tickets face predictable problems:

• Illegible or incomplete process notes that are useless for root cause analysis.
• Tickets lost, damaged or misfiled before they ever reach QA or engineering.
• Setpoint changes scribbled on paper but never pushed back into master recipes.
• Slow, manual correlation between machine histories, lots and customer complaints.

By contrast, paperless molding tickets support:

• Real-time visibility of job status, scrap and downtime on every press.
• Reliable evidence for BMR, eBMR, DHR and customer-specific traceability demands.
• Faster investigations when resin, tooling or parameter changes are suspected causes.

For regulated plastics applications – medical devices, pharma packaging, food contact parts – paperless molding tickets are often the only practical way to maintain compliant, searchable records across thousands of small jobs and tool changes.

3) Relationship to Batch Tickets, eBMR and DHR

Paperless molding tickets sit in the same family as other electronic records:

• Batch tickets: Job- or batch-level records that consolidate material, process and inspection data.
• Electronic batch records (eBMR): Full, stepwise records commonly used in pharma and nutraceuticals.
• Device history records (DHR): Product- or lot-level records required by medical device regulations.

In plastics, paperless molding tickets usually act as the press-level execution layer feeding these higher-level records. They provide time-stamped events, operator actions and process data that can be rolled up into batch, device or shipment views when needed.

4) Core Building Blocks – Master Data, UI, Interfaces & Sign-Off

Effective paperless molding tickets depend on four building blocks:

• Master data: Controlled part, tool, resin and parameter definitions in ERP/MES.
• Operator UI: Simple, press-side screens that reflect the ticket in a logical, stepwise flow.
• Machine interfaces: Signals or data links from the molding machine, auxiliaries and SCADA where available.
• Electronic sign-off: Operator and supervisor e-signatures bound to the ticket and user accounts.

Without solid master data, the ticket will be full of free-text fields and workarounds. Without a good UI, operators will bypass the system whenever production gets tight. Without machine data, the ticket becomes “structured paper” rather than a genuinely digital record.

5) What Paperless Molding Tickets Typically Capture

A well-designed paperless molding ticket for a press will usually capture:

• Job and part identifiers, revisions and customer codes.
• Tooling identifiers – mold ID, cavity count, EOAT ID where relevant.
• Material information – resin grade, color masterbatch, regrind usage and lot numbers.
• Key process parameters or windows – either downloaded automatically or recorded as verified.
• Startup checks – first piece approval, dimensional checks, visual checks.
• In-process controls – sample checks per shift, machine alarms, short-stop reasons.
• Scrap reasons – coded categories feeding SPC and COPQ analyses.
• End-of-run data – total shots, good pieces, scrap, clean-down and segregation status.

All of this can be surfaced later in quality reviews, customer complaints, deviation investigations and continuous improvement projects without hunting through boxes of old paperwork.

6) Roles & Responsibilities – Operators, Setters, QA, Planning

Paperless molding tickets work best when responsibilities are clear:

• Operators: Follow on-screen steps, perform required checks and complete data entry where automation is not available.
• Setters / technicians: Verify and, where authorised, adjust parameters within defined limits, signing electronically.
• QA: Define required checks, review records and sign off high-risk or regulated jobs.
• Planning / scheduling: Ensure jobs, tools and materials are correctly loaded so tickets reflect reality on the press.

Ambiguous ownership – “anyone on the line can fill in the ticket” – is a red flag in regulated plastics. Role-based access via user access management helps ensure the right people perform and sign the right steps.

7) Integration with ERP, MES, WMS and Machine Data

Paperless molding tickets are most powerful when connected across systems:

• ERP: Supplies demand, customer data and part masters; receives confirmed quantities and scrap for costing.
• MES: Orchestrates work order execution, presents the ticket UI and stores the detailed record.
• WMS: Aligns good parts, regrind and scrap dispositions with physical locations and labels.
• Machine / SCADA: Delivers cycle counts, alarms and weight/pressure/temperature data where interfaces exist.

The goal is a single version of the truth: the quantities and parameters recorded on the ticket match what ERP thinks was produced, what WMS moved and what the machine actually ran. Paper-based systems struggle to maintain that alignment once jobs get short and changeovers frequent.

8) How Paperless Tickets Support Traceability and Genealogy

For plastics and molding, traceability often hinges on questions like “which resin lot, which mold and which press produced this part?” Paperless molding tickets help answer them by:

• Binding resin lots, masterbatch lots and regrind usage to specific jobs and time windows.
• Linking job records to molds, cavities and presses for batch genealogy.
• Recording changes to parameters or materials during the run, not just at start-up.

That data can then feed higher-level end-to-end lot genealogy views across molding, assembly and packaging. Without paperless tickets, many of these links must be reconstructed manually or are simply unknown.

9) Paperless Molding Tickets vs. “Scanning Paper”

Simply scanning paper tickets at the end of the run is not the same as implementing paperless molding tickets. Key differences include:

• Enforcement: Digital tickets can enforce mandatory fields, checks and sign-offs before the job can progress.
• Timeliness: Data is available in real time for dashboards and alerts, not weeks later.
• Structure: Codes and fields drive analytics; scanned handwriting does not.
• Integration: Events can trigger WMS moves, QA workflows and CAPA actions automatically.

Scanning has value for legacy jobs and historical archiving, but genuine paperless molding tickets require the execution and recording to be born digital at the press, not digitised after the fact.

10) Links to Paperless Manufacturing and Shop Floor Culture

Paperless molding tickets are a practical expression of broader paperless manufacturing goals. They bring benefits and cultural shifts:

• Operators spend less time shuffling paper, more time running stable processes.
• Supervisors and engineers can see status without walking the entire shop floor.
• Quality and CI teams gain reliable data to back up decisions.

The shift also exposes gaps: uncontrolled parameter tweaks, unapproved tools, inconsistent scrap coding. Surfacing and correcting those behaviours is part of the value; paper tickets simply hid them from view.

11) KPIs and Continuous Improvement for Paperless Tickets

Paperless molding tickets open up new key performance indicators:

• Ticket completion rate and on-time sign-off for required checks.
• Discrepancies between planned and actual scrap by press, tool and shift.
• Time from event (complaint, deviation) to retrieval of relevant ticket data.
• Correlation of parameter windows with OEE and quality outcomes.

These metrics help distinguish between plants that “have a system” and plants that genuinely use paperless molding tickets as levers for better performance and compliance.

12) Common Failure Modes and Red Flags

Weak implementations of paperless molding tickets tend to show familiar symptoms:

• Operators printing screenshots or “shadow” paper tickets to work around bad screens.
• Large free-text fields used instead of properly coded scrap or deviation reasons.
• Parameter changes being made at the machine but not captured in the ticket.
• Tickets that are opened automatically with every job but rarely completed or reviewed.

Auditors and customers quickly spot these patterns. They indicate that the system exists mainly for show – the real decisions are still being made off-system, just as they were with paper, but without the honesty of a visible clipboard.

13) Change Management and Operator Adoption

Switching to paperless molding tickets is as much about people as technology:

• Screen design must reflect the way operators actually work at the machine.
• Training needs to focus on “what’s in it for you” – fewer re-runs, clearer expectations, faster problem solving.
• Supervisors must reinforce that “if it’s not in the ticket, it didn’t happen” for investigations and rewards.

Plants that treat paperless tickets as a compliance project often get minimal adoption. Plants that use them to remove friction – fewer phone calls, fewer surprises, fewer arguments about what was run – tend to see much stronger engagement.

14) Digitalisation & Industry 4.0 – Paperless Tickets as a Data Backbone

In an Industry 4.0 context, paperless molding tickets are one of the key data backbones for plastics operations:

• They feed SPC, OEE and energy dashboards with correctly contextualised data.
• They provide labelled examples for AI-driven pattern recognition in scrap, alarms and parameter drifts.
• They anchor sensor and historian data to specific jobs, tools, parts and customers.

However, simply capturing data is not enough. Validation, governance and QMS alignment are still needed so that the digital records satisfy both operational needs and regulatory expectations.

15) FAQ

Q1. Are paperless molding tickets only useful for regulated plastics?
No. Regulated sectors (medical devices, pharma packaging, food contact) have the strongest drivers, but non-regulated plastics and automotive suppliers also gain clear benefits. Faster problem solving, more accurate costing, fewer disputes about scrap and better scheduling make paperless molding tickets valuable even where formal BMR or DHR requirements do not apply.

Q2. Do we need direct machine integration to implement paperless molding tickets?
Direct integration is highly desirable but not mandatory. Many plants start with operator-entered data for key fields and add machine interfaces later as controls and budgets allow. The critical step is to standardise the ticket structure and workflow; automation can then progressively reduce manual entry and improve accuracy.

Q3. How do paperless molding tickets relate to our existing batch or device records?
In most architectures, paperless molding tickets act as the press-level execution record feeding higher-level batch or device records. They can be linked or embedded as sub-records within an eBMR or DHR, providing detailed evidence for specific steps such as molding, overmolding or insert placement without bloating the top-level document.

Q4. What is the typical starting scope for a paperless molding ticket project?
A pragmatic starting scope is to focus on one press family, one product family or one high-risk customer and deploy paperless tickets there first. Capture job data, basic parameters, scrap codes and electronic sign-offs, stabilise the workflow, then expand to more presses, more products and deeper integrations once the pattern is proven on the shop floor.

Q5. How do we handle situations where the press runs many small jobs per shift?
High-mix molding is where paperless molding tickets add the most value. Jobs can be sequenced and preloaded from scheduling so operators select the next ticket and confirm tool and material changes instead of writing new paperwork every hour. Templates and defaults minimise data entry while still maintaining job-level traceability for each small run.

Related Reading
• Execution & Records: Batch Ticket | Electronic Batch Record (eBMR) | Device History Record (DHR) | Paperless Manufacturing
• Systems & Data: MES – Manufacturing Execution System | Warehouse Management System (WMS) | SCADA | Manufacturing Data Historian
• Quality & Governance: Quality Management System (QMS) | User Access Management (UAM) | Deviation / Nonconformance (NC) | CAPA | Statistical Process Control (SPC)