Mystery Maker Unmarked (Plastic)

Designer	Not known
Maker	Not known
Marks	No marks
Material	Injection moulded plastic
Description	Square bowl with rounded corners.  Single external colour with white interior.  Circular footring and tab handle to one corner.
Condition	Very good
Number	No number
Production Date	Early 1970s?
Width at rim	128mm
Width at Base	75mm
Depth	45mm
Length (with handle)	163mm
Weight	107gm
Volume	375ml
Acquisition	Purchase Camberwell Sunday Market 8th August 2013
Rameking Reference Number	MMU-P-001-011

Not all ramekins were ceramic.  As technology progressed, new materials became the norm.  Look at your keyboard dear reader.  The chances are that its plastic keys were formed by injection moulding.  Since the Second World War, the uses for injection moulded polymer material had exploded.  These ramekins are another example. There are many different types of injection moulding, but commonly, granular plastic is gravity fed into a hopper where it moves into a heated chamber where it melts.  A plunger advances, forcing the melted plastic through an opening into the mould.  Because the mould is kept cold, the plastic solidifies as soon as the mould is filled.

These particular ramekins were made using co-injection moulding process that creates a skin and core arrangement.  The skin material is injected first followed by a core material.   The white interior of the ramekin is injected first, followed by the exterior.  The white plastic cools and the green plastic flows around it, also cooling.  The nozzle at the base is then closed and the ramekin expelled from the mould.  The mark on the base where the plastic was injected in clearly visible in the centre of the base.