Transfer inovci 24/2012 2012

OPTIMIZATION OF INJECTION MOLDING MANUFACTURING

FOR AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY
Ing. udmila Dulebov, PhD. the mold tool together afterwards the product is set
prof. Ing. Frantiek Grekovi, CSc. to cool which helps it in the solidification process.
Ing. Branislav Duleba
Department of Technologies and Materials,
Faculty of Mechanical Engineering,
Technical University of Koice, Letn 9, Koice,
Slovakia
e-mail: ludmila.dulebova@tuke.sk
frantisek.greskovic@tuke.sk
branislav.duleba@tuke.sk
Ph.D. Eng. Volodymyr Krasinskiy
Department of Chemical Technology of Plastics,
Lviv Polytechnic National University,
12, Bandera Str., Lviv, 79013, Ukraine Fig. 1 Layout of injection molding machine
e-mail: vkrasinsky82@gmail.com
After the product gets its shape the two platens
Abstract will move away from each other in order to
separate the mold tool which is known as mold
This contribution deals with optimization opening and finally the molded product is ejected or
of injection molding process. Optimization of removed from the mold. And the process will
process with configuration of main parameters repeat itself.
influences on velocity of injection cycle, quality of The molding cycle (Fig.2) starts with the
moulds and energy consumption. The aim is to retraction of the ejector plate, followed by closing
reduce the time of the injection process and reduce of the mold. The injection unit melts the polymer
the number of defective parts during mass resin and injects the polymer melt into the mold.
production. Examination analyzing injection
molding production process and optimize the
manufacturing process using MPA software.
Key words: injection molding, optimization of
process, MPA, moldflow simulations

1. THE INJECTION MOLDING PROCESS

Injection molding is the most commonly used
manufacturing process for the fabrication of plastic
parts. A wide variety of products are manufactured
using injection molding, which vary greatly in their
size, complexity, and application. The injection
molding process requires the use of an injection
molding machine, raw plastic material, and a mold.
The plastic is melted in the injection molding
machine and then injected into the mold, where it
cools and solidifies into the final part. Layout of
classical injection molding machine is shown in
Fig.1.
Fig. 2 Injection molding cycle
The injection molding process stages starts
with the feeding of a polymer through hopper to The ram fed injection molding machine uses a
barrel which is then heated with the sufficient hydraulically operated plunger to push the plastic
temperature to make it flow, then the molten plastic through a heated region. The melt converges at a
which was melted will be injected under high nozzle and is injected into the mold. The melt is
pressure into the mold the process is commonly forced into the mold in two or three stages:
known as Injection, After injection pressure will be
applied to both platens of the injection molding Stage 1: Fill stage
machine(moving and fixed platens) in order to hold During this stage, the mold cavities are filled
with molten resin. As the material is forced

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forward, it passes over a spreader, or torpedo, Requirements for production were to meet
within the barrel, which causes mixing. This stage all main dimensions in tolerances, no visual defects
is determined by an injection velocity (rate), a (burns, stains) and to control the internal surface of
pressure, and a time. Injection velocity is the rate at bore.
which the plunger moves forward.
Stage 2: Pack stage
As the melt enters the mold, it cools and
introduces shrinkage. The pack stage is necessary to
force more melt into the mold to compensate for
shrinkage.
Stage 3: Hold stage
When no more material can be forced into
the mold, melt can still leak back through the gate.
The hold stage applies forces against the material in
the cavity until the gate freezes to prevent leaking
of the melt. In some machines, pack and hold are
combined into a single second or holding stage.
The aim of this paper is to identify and
select the optimal conditions for the technological
process of injection molding of selected part to
determine the optimal conditions. Injection process
is affected by number of factors that influences on
productivity and accuracy of injection molding as
well as on the overall cost associated with its
production.

2. EXPERIMENTAL SECTION

2.1 Characteristic of plastic molding

In this paper, the production of plastic
molding for the automotive industry was optimized
in terms of technological conditions of
manufacturing (Fig. 3). The molding must meet
high requirements in terms of dimensional accuracy
and required surface roughness of the internal hole.
Manufactured part - valve seats, may not have any
functional or visual errors (material burns, material
defects and sink marks).
Fig. 4 Injection mold for production of selected part
The inner hole is defined by limit samples.
After about 480,000 cycles unsatisfactory surface
holes began to appear at certain point. This defect
was removed by increasing the injection pressure
and injection speed, which results in burns on the
molding (Fig.5).

Fig.3 Model of product and finished molding

For the production of moldings Arburg
Allrounder injection press 270C-400-70 was used.
Injection mold for plastic molding is single-mold
form without the hot inlet, with a life expectancy of
500,000 cycles (Fig.4).
Fig. 5 Unsatisfactory inner surface of the bore and
damaged core shape
After a thorough inspection and analysis of
mold was found damaged shaped core, creating
holes on the inner surface of the cover. For this
reason it was necessary to optimize the
manufacturing process of molding.

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2.2 Optimization of injection molding Analysis of injection pressure

production process
Simulation in Fig.7 shows the pressure
For the production of valve seat polyamide
drop of the melt in the mold cavity. Simulations
PA 66 was used, labeled Ultramid A3WG7,
provide an explanation why at places between three
produced by BASF. This material is one of
inlets were material burns only in two places. In
engineering plastics, containing 35% glass fibers,
place between a pair of inlets where simulation
which increases the rigidity, strength, dimensional
showed noticeable pressure drop showed as blue
stability and resistance to creep at elevated
(with lowest pressure), the burn wasnt created
temperatures. Ultramid A3GW7 is quite frequently
because of the pressure drop, respectively.
used materials in the automotive industry.
Preparation of plastic granules for injection
consisted of drying in an oven with a molecular
sieve and then checking granulate moisture by
Aquatrac measurement system according to data
sheet of material.
Optimization of the production process
consisted of the simulation of the injection process
using the Moldflow software, manufacturing of
injection moulds with determined parameters and
weighing and measuring the tested samples.

2.3 Analysis of molding production using

Moldflow Plastics Advisers (MPA)
MPA is a software program that contains a Fig. 7 Analysis of injection pressure drop
set of analyzes able to analyze and simulate the
injection process and the filling of cavity by plastic Analysis of quality prediction
material. Plastics Adviser is able to identify
problems that may occur during the plastic flow, Analysis of quality prediction (Fig.8)
creates simulations of cavity fill, identify problem shows the overall quality of product and identifies
areas of the molding, pressure drops etc. the places where the reduced quality may occur
during the molding process. Simulation shows
Analysis of the cavity fills places with possible reduction of quality with
yellow colour. Further reduction in the quality of
This part of the simulation analyzes the
molding is presumable near the bore and at the edge
time required to fill the mold cavity with melt. The
simulation clearly shows the areas around inlets, of molding.
which are filled with material at first. Places that
are filled at the last place are places atthe edge of
the cover between inlets. In terms of quality the
simulation confirmed that the spaces between the
inlets, the critical during production. At low
pressure, these places are unfilled, and at high
injection rates are currently at these places burns of
material (Fig.6).

Fig. 8 Analysis of quality prediction

2.4 Determination of optimal temperature for

Fig. 6 Analysis of the cavity fill
injection form
Before process of injection molding it is
necessary to ensure enough tempered form.
Practical tests have found that the form at
temperature below 72 C presented manufacturing
during the automatic operation of the machine.

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Form was deficiently tempered and the problem
with ejection of inlet occurred. To ensure trouble-
free production the optimal temperature of the mold
was determined to 75 C.
Determination of optimal temperature mode
The original model was modified in terms
of suitable technological changes, as the core forms
were also damaged, shown in Figure 4. After
changing the model, simulation was performed; this
didnt revealed serious short comings. The aim of
the simulation was to determine the appropriate
technological parameters of injection. As the main
parameter of interest was the injection temperature.
To determine the optimum temperature mode,
several tests were made based on the values from
the material list (melting point of the material is
255 C). Temperature profiles of jet and screw is
shown in Table 1.
At each temperature profile were measured
several cycles of injection and injection parameters
(dosing time, mold filling time and the maximum
pressure of the melt). These were measured by
weighing pressed moldings in various temperature
profiles and investigated the material pillow (the
amount of melt that stays as a reserve material in
the injection machine). Weight of moulds was
determined by the weight Helagocalibration
accuracy with 0,001 grams (Table 2).

Tab. 1 Tested temperature profiles

Selected temperature profiles
Label of profile Temperature of jet Temperatures at screw [C]
[C]
Phase 1 Phase 2 Phase 3
1 340 330 320 310
2 325 315 305 295
3 320 310 300 290
4 315 305 295 290
5 300 290 280 270

Tab. 2 The average measured values for different temperature profiles

Temperature Weight of Dosing time Material Screw path Max. Mold filling
profile mould [g] [sec.] pillow [g] [mm] pressure of time [sec.]
melt [bar]
1 7.654 2.453 2.820 40 585.33 1.500
2 7.642 2.463 2.842 40 707.33 1.603
3 7.639 2.486 2.853 40 847.33 1.636
4 7.628 2.503 2.875 40 1004.30 1.816
5 7.619 2.530 2.890 40 1214.30 2.003

Discussion of measured values for different
temperature profiles
Table 1 and Table 2 shows that when the
temperatures at the nozzle and the screw are higher,
the time of the dosage lowers. Dosing Time is at all
temperature profiles less than 3 seconds, and
cooling of moulds takes up to 10 seconds.
At the temperature profile No.1 is
temperature of nozzle and screw very high. At these
temperatures, the risk of degradation possibility of
the material often occurs. This profile would be
able to shorten the production cycle, but does not
guarantee the quality pressings. For the production
of these moulds, even temperature profile No.5 was
inconvenient with a temperature of 300C at nozzle.
The reason was the relatively high pressure of
molding and low quality. More time is needed for
the injection and probably would require a longer
holding pressure phase. For the same
reason, was excluded and temperature profile No.4
with nozzle temperature 315 C. In the remaining
two profiles it was necessary to consider the
advantages and convenience of use. Although the
difference between the weight and filling time were
minimal, there was a significant difference in the
maximum filling pressure. For this reason, as the
optimum temperature profile was chosen profile
No. 2, with a temperature of nozzle 325 C.
After evaluating of moulds at different
speeds of injection was injection rate of 30 ccm/s
chosen as the most suitable. The reason for this
choice was high quality of moulds, without failures
and burns. Determination of the holding pressure
was primary based on the weight of the moldings.
By the increasing time of holding pressure, the
cooling time was gradually reduced. Reducing the
cooling time with raising the holding pressure

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phase did not affect the quality of the moldings.
High-quality surface of samples was observed at 4
sec holding pressure time.
Conclusion
The task of the optimization was to create
moldings with required quality in the shorter
injection cycle, without compromising their quality.
As the optimal temperature profile was chosen
profile No.2. Injection cycle after optimization
decreased from 22.9 seconds to 20.2 seconds, i.e.
2.7 seconds.
The simulation included a test of process
parameters obtained during the optimization of
injection molding process. Fill analysis of the
cavity and injection pressure analysis revealed the
cause of burns in two places between inlet
moldings. Analysis of quality prediction revealed
the possible problems during production and
confirms problems from praxis.
Optimization of the injection cycle and
error analysis yielded shortens production cycle and
reduced the proportion of waste during production
because of visual defects. Thus optimization of this
part and process saves the energy and material
costs.
References
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This paper is the result of the project
implementation: Technological and design
aspects of extrusion and injection moulding of
thermoplastic polymer composites and
nanocomposites (PIRSES-GA-2010-269177)
supported by The international project realized
in range of Seventh Frame Program of
European Union (FP7), Marie Curie Actions,
International Research Staff
Exchange Scheme (IRSES) and this
implementation: Center for research of control
of technical, environmental and human risks for
permanent development of production and
products in mechanical engineering ( ITMS:
26220120060) supported by the Research
&Development Operational Programme funded
by the ERDF.