Plastic Machine Operator

Plastics Machine Operator (Double Days)

Company: MonoVerde Plastics Ltd

Location: Unit C3, Hamilton Industrial Estate, Leicester

Shifts: 06:00 to 14:00 and 14:00 to 22:00, Monday to Friday, alternating weekly

Positions available: 2

Contract: Full time, permanent

About us

MonoVerde Plastics is an injection moulding operation in Leicester producing recycled polypropylene products for the construction and landscaping sectors: ground reinforcement grids, drainage channels, modular building blocks and flooring systems. Everything we make is manufactured from recycled material.

We are a small, growing site running BOLE injection moulding machines. Demand is outstripping the hours we can currently run, which is why we are moving to a double day shift pattern.

The role

You will run and monitor the moulding cells across a two shift operation, alternating weekly between earlies and lates. Scott, our lead setter, overlaps both shifts, so you are never far from someone who knows the machines.

This is an operator role rather than a setting role. Your job is to keep the cells producing good parts, deal with the routine stops, pack and stage the output, and hand over cleanly to the next shift.

What you will be doing

Across both shifts

• Monitoring machine performance, cycle times and part quality across multiple cells
• Removing, inspecting, trimming and packing finished parts
• Palletising, labelling and staging completed stock for dispatch
• Feeding material and keeping hoppers and dryers charged
• Clearing routine stoppages: short shots, sticking parts, robot or conveyor faults, blocked feed
• Carrying out in-process quality checks against sample parts and recording results
• Logging production counts, scrap, downtime and reasons
• Escalating tool, process or machine faults promptly rather than working around them
• Keeping the shop floor clean, tidy and safe, including regrind and waste handling

On earlies (06:00 to 14:00)

• Startup: bringing machines up to temperature, checking dryers, first-off inspection before running production
• Receiving material deliveries and booking in stock
• Handing over to the late shift at 14:00

On lates (14:00 to 22:00)

• Taking handover from the early shift
• Preparing outbound pallets for next day collection
• End of shift shutdown: purging barrels, safe machine stop, isolating ancillaries and completing the shutdown checklist
• Locking up and securing the unit

What we are looking for

Essential

• Previous experience in a manufacturing or production environment
• Able to work both shifts on a weekly alternating basis, including the 06:00 start
• Reliable and punctual: with a small team, one absence stops a machine
• Able to work with minimal supervision and follow written procedures accurately
• Good attention to detail and willing to reject parts that are not right
• Basic numeracy and written English for recording production data
• Physically able to stand for a full shift and handle materials up to 25kg
• A reliable way of getting to Hamilton Industrial Estate for 06:00

Desirable

• Experience with injection moulding, ideally on BOLE, Engel, Arburg or similar
• Understanding of common moulding defects and their likely causes
• Forklift licence (counterbalance)
• Experience of working with recycled polymers
• Any level of setting experience, including basic mould changes

You do not need to arrive as a setter. If you have the aptitude and the interest, there is a clear route into setting and shift lead responsibility as we bring on more machines.

How the shift pattern works

Two shifts cover 06:00 to 22:00, Monday to Friday. You alternate weekly, so one week on earlies, the next on lates.

Scott, our lead setter, works across the middle of the day and overlaps both shifts. Startup and shutdown are fixed procedures and you will be fully trained on both. Doing the shutdown properly matters: a barrel left charged with recycled polypropylene overnight causes problems the following morning.

If something goes wrong that you cannot resolve, machines are alarmed and escalate to Scott, Jamie and Andy. Nothing about this role requires you to diagnose a tooling problem on your own. It requires you to spot it, stop the machine, record what you saw and pick up the phone.

What we offer

• £14 per hour including shift premium
• 28 days' holiday including bank holidays
• Workplace pension
• PPE and workwear provided
• Full training on our machines, tooling and products
• Progression into setting for the right person
• Finished by 22:00 with no night shifts and no weekends
• A small team where what you do visibly matters

To apply

Send a CV or a short summary of your experience to plastics@monoverde.co.uk. If you have moulding experience, tell us what machines and what materials.

• We are interviewing on a rolling basis and want both people in post as soon as possible.

MonoVerde