Eventos Anais de eventos
COBEF 2023
12th Brazilian Congress on Manufacturing Engineering
MOLDES DE INJEÇÃO DE ALUMÍNIO: EFEITOS DAS PROPRIEDADES TÉRMICAS DO MATERIAL DO MOLDE NOS PARÂMETROS DE INJEÇÃO E PROJETO DO MOLDE
Submission Author:
Evandro Menezes de Souza Amarante , BA
Co-Authors:
João Pedro Andrade Pereira, Sarah Gomes Araújo de Jesus, Evandro Menezes de Souza Amarante, Armando Sá Ribeiro Júnior, Cristiano Vasconcellos Ferreira, Valter Estevão Beal
Presenter: João Pedro Andrade Pereira
doi://10.26678/ABCM.COBEF2023.COF23-0140
Abstract
In thermoplastics injection moulding, the polymer is inserted into an injection machine in which it is softened, injected inside the mould cavity, compacted and cooled, until it reaches the required solidity to its extraction. In this context, it is worth noticing that the injection parameters and the moulded part characteristics (e.g., contraction marks, welding lines, warpage) are important features that must be inspected, in order to ensure that the productivity and quality requirements are achieved. The moulds are commonly made of steel, due to its high mechanical strength, good thermal stability and the possibility to easily obtain the desired surface finish. Despite these advantages, steel has a low thermal conductivity when compared to other metals, such as aluminum, resulting in more time required for the part to cool down before extraction and consequently, longer injection moulding cycles. However, there is a lack of information regarding the usage of aluminum for thermoplastic’s injection moulds. Therefore, there is a demand to evaluate the thermal properties of the aluminum on the heat exchange between the mould and the moulded part during the injection cycle, in order to improve the project of aluminum moulds, especially their cooling system. Such information is crucial to assess the viability of aluminum moulds usage in the manufacturing process of large batches of plastic moulded parts. It is also of interest to determine the optimal parameters related to each injection cycle stage. This paper aims to verify the differences found between the cooling system and the moulding parameters applied to steel and aluminum moulds, by performing numerical simulations of the moulding process. To determine the optimal parameters related to each stage of the injection moulding process, the Design of Experiments Taguchi and the software Moldflow were used to plan and develop the rheological simulations. The results reveal that the difference between the mould’s materials properties changes significantly the injection moulding conditions and the mould design, particularly the cooling system efficiency. These results are essential to guide the mould project and to define the optimal injection parameters in aluminum moulds.
Keywords
Aluminum moulds, Cooling system, mould injection parameters
