ADVANCED MOLD DESIGN TECHNOLOGIES

Introduction:
In the jungles of Africa every lion knows that it should run faster than the slowest gazelle
to survive. Similarly every gazelle knows that it should run faster than the fastest lion to
survive. This is the law of nature, called the law of survival of the fittest. (Slide 2) .
This law is equally applicable to all kinds of organizations big or small especially in these
days of globalization more than ever before. The key to survival & growth in this
millennium is paraphrased in the motto of Olympic Games which reads as
"Citius, Altius, Fortius" in Latin, meaning "Swifter, Higher, Stronger"(Slide 3) .
New products & processes are driven by ever increasing customer expectations on
one side & by ever evolving new technologies on the other (Slide 4). Let us look at some of
the advanced technologies as applicable to injection molding process.
Requirements of the plastics industry are becoming increasingly complex and
rigorous viz. Cut costs; Accelerate time to market; Shorten production cycle times;
Improve quality towards six sigma. (Slide 5).If you were to ask, How to cut costs?
How to shorten production cycle times? How to improve quality towards six sigma?
Then one of the answers is More cost effective toolings through advanced Mold
Design Technologies (Slide 7). Let us look in detail at a few of such technologies.

1. In Mold Decoration Technology:

If you happen to have a cheap calculator made a few years ago, you may find that
the printed digits and letters on the keypads have worn out & are not any more
visible, but due to your practice, you may still continue to use it (Slide 9). There is
one more deficiency in this old printed design. You cant use it in dark environment.
You would like to have backlit keypads as in modern cell phones, which brings us to
the design of No-wear & Back-lit Decoration Design called In-Mold Decoration or
for short IMD.
Two examples of decorations which can be backlit & which can also last till their
products last without any wear or tear whatsoever are depicted in Slides 10&11.

Description of the IMD Process:

First step consists in selecting a suitable heat resistant film material compatible
with the polymer to be used in association with it. The desired decoration is screen

printed in one or two stages (For backlighting, you print the white graphics first,
followed by the black background next) (Slide 12)
The second step is thermo-vacuum forming the film to the desired 3 dimensional
shape & trimming it such that the film will be a snug fit into the mold cavity (Slide
13)

The third & last step is placing the decorated & trimmed film in the
cavity of the injection mold & injecting the polymer creating a good
bond between the two & preserving the printed ink on the back or
the hidden side. (Slide 14). The various options available for doing
thermo vacuum forming is depicted in Slide 15. Forming Moulds for

films (Prototypes): Prototype moulds may be constructed from common

materials such as plaster, hard woods, fiberglass, syntactic foam, and silicone
These materials are relatively easy to work with and permit minor
modifications. DRYING
Lexan sheeted film must be dried prior to nearly all thermoforming operations
The moisture content in the film can cause moisture bubbling and loss of detail.
For drying you can use a hot air circulating oven set at 120C
The film should be racked vertically and horizontally in the oven with a
separation between the sheets of approximately 25mm
The draft angles for the vacuum forming molds & design guidelines are shown in
slides 20, 21 to35. Two more applications of IMD are shown in Slides 36-37. The
two prime advantages of IMD over conventional molding are depicted in slides 3839

2.Hot Runner Mold System

This part of the presentation deals with a technology that offers many advantages for
parts big or small. Runners are the channels made within a mould to transfer the plastics
melt from injection molding machine to the cavity. In conventional molding, the entire feed
system channels called sprue, runners and subrunners freezes along with the part & thus
the feed system represents a certain amount of loss, as they are discarded on demolding.
The Hotrunner system is an externally heated device incorporated in plastic injection
moulds to replace the conventional flow channels. A complete Hotrunner system consists of a
central sprue, manifold and hot nozzles as its elements.(Fig )

Hotrunner system can be semi hotrunner system or a fully hotrunner system. By

using semi hotrunner system major part of main runners is eliminated. Fully hot
runner system eliminates runners and subrunners completely.

Advantages of Hotrunner Mold System:

1.SAVING OF RAW MATERIAL:
By using hotrunner system the runners and subrunners are eliminated partially or
completely. This saves the raw material used to mould the runner lay out which is
not actually the desired end product but a compulsory wastage.
2.REDUCTION OF CYCLE TIMES:
SAVING ON COOLING TIME - When a part is being fed by a runner, the
runner thickness is normally 5 times more than the wall thickness of the part to
be moulded which consumes more cooling time than the actual cooling time
required for cooling the part. With hotrunner system this extra cooling time is
saved.
SAVING ON OPENING / CLOSING TIME - When we run a conventional
mould, more opening of the mould is required to eject the runners. This opening
is twice the length of the runners. By using hot runner system this extra
opening and closing is eliminated and therefore the opening, closing and ejection
time is saved.
SAVING ON HOLDING TIME - Since with hotrunner the runners are in
molten form, no holding time is required to eliminate sink marks on the part
normally caused by thicker runners.
3.ELIMINATION OF SECONDARY OPERATIONS:
With hotrunner system the desired gate vestige can be obtained on the part. This
saves the secondary operations on the part like removing sprue, gate marks and
sprue bush marks.
4.ENABLING LONG FLOW LENGTHS MOULDING:
The flow length in conventional moulds includes the runner length. With hotrunner
system the part length from the gate point is flow length. Hence, the flow length is
reduced. This makes the use of smaller capacity moulding machines possible for
moulding larger parts where flow length is a restriction.
5.ENERGY SAVING:
Reduced Plastication - by eliminating runner system thus reducing total shot weight

3.Moldflow Analysis:

The next Technology on Mold Design is the ability to prevent problems before they
occur. Generally speaking highly experienced mold designers develop a feel for the
answers to the questions like How many gates? Where to locate them? What is the
cycle time? What is the injection pressure required? What is the clamping Force?
Where to provide air-vents? Etc. all based on hard experience! They will never
hesitate to alter the mold during its Proving Trials. But there is an elegant method

to optimize the feed system before the mold is made. That is called the Moldflow
Analysis technique. Let us look at a typical automotive component (Slide47)
The 3D CAD model shows a component ~1200 mm long, 200mm wide & having
camber of 80mm. It is 3mm thick. The material is an alloy of PC & PBT with a
density of 1300 kg/m3. Its mass is ~ 1kg. The objective is to optimize the gating
system & associated parameters.
The corresponding FEM model & its nomenclature are shown in Slide 48.
The feed system details are shown in Slide 49. The thickness plots vide slide 50
&51
reveal that the part has almost uniform thickness of 3mm except in areas
around the three holes & also along its length near its edge, as desired by the
customer.
Slide 52 depicts the process parameters. Slide 53says that the centre gate opens
first & after 3.3 sec time the gates B & C open to complete the fill. Slide 54 is the
Fill time plot showing 6.2sec to fully fill the cavity. Slide 55 depicts the 4
situations during filling process. The centre gate opens first starting the fill. The
situation just before 3.3 sec is shown by the fig on the right top. After 3.3 sec the
gates B & C open augmenting the fill. The fig on the right bottom shows the
position at < 6.3 sec just before fill is complete.
Slide 56shows the temperature plot of the flow front having a temperature drop
of 18deg C, whereas the permissible difference is 20 deg C. Slide 57shows the
pressure switch over at maximum pressure. Slide 58 shows the pressure at the end
of fill, at a pressure of 95.7MPa. Slide 59 shows that the maximum pressure at the
point of injection is after 5.97 sec. Slide 60 shows the plot of clamping tonnage vs
time, which depicts the maximum value as ~1450 tons. Slide 61shows the locations
of the weld lines as to be around the two holes. What would be the locations of the
weld lines if all the three gates were to open simultaneously is revealed by the
slide 62, as against the one obtained by sequential valve gating system, thus
validating the superiority of the latter over the former. Naturally the question will
arise in the mind of the onlooker whether the weld represents any weakness of the
part. This question is answered by the temperaure weldline overlay plot in slide 63.
Since the location of the weldlines are in the same temperature zone of 260 deg C
it represents materially a strong weld. Slide 64 reveals the air trap locations, thus
telling the tool maker as to where to provide the air vents. The details of the
moldflow analysis results are summarized in slide 65. Slide 66 gives an idea of the
input / output relationship through moldflow analysis technique. In the hands of
the experts the computational fluid dynamic analysis is a powerful design aid to
achieve maximum quality within minimum time. Without Moldflow we may be forced

to do very costly mold corrections after the mold is made. Moldflow enables us to
avoid process problems in molding through computer simulation.

4.Dynamic Feed:

Balancing the flow & achieving proper filling of multi cavity molds, family molds &
large sized parts with complex shapes present a series of problems of their own
due to inherent statistical variations of the process. In spite of all computer
analysis, still on the shop floor you always get slight variations in the performance
of the injection molding machine. How to reduce these variations?
Dynamic Feed is an answer to this question. At the gate point there is a sensor
which monitors the pressure time history & compares it with its given target graph.
Once the target value is achieved it closes the gate thus achieving consistently
high quality moldings. Its schematic sketch & internal details are depicted in Figs.
The Advantages of Dynamic Feed are:
Maximum control
Minimal operator expertise
Consistent High Quality
Zero Melt waste
The pressure sensor is subjected to the melt temperature. As on date the
materials for which the dynamic feed device is readily applicable are given in Fig.
Please note that hotrunner is applicable to all polymer materials whereas the
application of dynamic feed is somewhat limited. Dynamic Feed represents the
latest development in mold design Technologies.
CONCLUSION:
We have seen four different mold design technologies viz. IMD, Moldflow Analysis,
Hotrunner Mold System & Dynamic Feed. Technology constantly strives to improve
quality and reduce cost to the customer and do this faster & faster. To survive &
grow we need to constantly keep pace with technological progress.