Can I have samples before molding process ?

Customer: I have a design that I want to make mold and plastic part for ,but I'm not sure if the design would work with its application,so can we have some samples first before the mold is started to optimize the design ?

Shiner :Well ,it depends .For plastic injection molding industry ,the samples that are the same with the production parts can only be available after mold is done . But there are CNC proptype and 3D printed samples ,these samples are made of plastic material(generally ABS material ),but different plastic material than the injection molding plastic part material . Prototype sample material is with lower density and thus lower strength .So it can be used for some dimension checkings but may not be sufficient for functional checking . Also ,injection plastic part can be done in any PMS or RAL color,or clear transparent color, but the protoype samples can't be transparent color so it's more limited . Please consider as per above details before you decide if protoype or 3D printed samples are needed .Thank you .