Universidad Carlos III de Madrid

Aerospace Design - HW1

Injection Mold Design

Enrique Bello Benı́tez

Jorge Cardı́n Vigal
Ionut Alexandru Cosuleanu
Alberto Ghidini Linares
Hasier Goitia Hernández

March 2016
Injection Mold Design

Contents
1 General Mold Design 2

2 Redesign of the piece 3

3 Feed System 4

4 Separation of the Feed System 6

5 Cooling system 7

6 Ejection system 9

7 Venting system 10

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Injection Mold Design

Density, ρsteel [kg/m3 ] Thermal conductivity (100◦ C), ksteel [W/mK] Specific heat, Cpsteel [J/kgK]
8000 16.3 500

Table 1: Stainless steel properties

Young´s Modulus, EABS [MPa] 2280

Yield Strenght, σy,ABS [M pa] 44
Minimum melt. temperature [◦ C] 218
Maximum melt. temperature [◦ C] 260
Minimum coolant temperature [◦ C] 49
Maximum coolant temperature [◦ C] 71
Desnsity at 20◦ C [kg/m3 ] 1044
Desnsity at melt. temp. [kg/m3 ] 930
Specific heat, Cp,ABS [J/kgK] 2340

Table 2: ABS properties

1 General Mold Design

Aquı́ hay que hablar de two-plate vs. three-plate molds y justificar la distribucion de cucha-
ras.

(a) Design 1 (b) Design 2

Figure 1: Possible spoon distributions for mold designs

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Injection Mold Design

Figure 2: Feed System Dimensions

2 Redesign of the piece

Starting from the raw spoon shown in Figure 3 which, although it may fulfill the customer
size specifications, presents some problems in terms of feasibility during the casting process.

Figure 3: Raw Spoon

First of all it is necessary to note that the raw spoon is composed entirely of straight surfaces
that end in sharp corners. These corners may lead to several problems such as shrinkage,
stress concentration and not proper filling of the cavity, so they need to be rounded. This
fact also applies to the regions where the cross section suffers a sharp change (head - handle
connection).
A wall that is parallel to the axis of extraction and that is in contact with the mold, presents
higher friction and requires a higher force to be extracted. Introducing round corners and
a draft angle is beneficial to avoid these problems when extracting the part from the mold.
By doing this, the time during which the part and the mold surfaces are in contact (and
therefore the friction) is reduced.

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Injection Mold Design

Although it is not a problem in terms of structural capabilities, the amount of material that
it is needed to manufacture the bulk spoon is not optimized, which is translated into a higher
material cost without improving its properties. In order to reduce the required material, a
longitudinal cavity is performed along the handle, and the head and lateral walls thicknesses
are also reduced.
Another possibility is to further reduce the handle walls thickness and introduce a rib to
increase the solidity of the structure.This approach was rejected because this configuration
may cause problems during the filling of the part for the selected spoon distribution inside
the mold

Figure 4: Final spoon design

Some aesthetic changes are also introduced to improve the visual aspect of the spoon, but
they are not relevant during the molding process.

3 Feed System
The dimensions of the runners that conform the feed system are largely free to be chosen,
with three constraints: linear velocity is to be kept constant throughout, the flow must be
laminar in the runners, and a maximum pressure drop must be imposed.
Linear velocity must be imposed throughout the feed system at each intersection where a
runner of cross-sectional area Au diverges into n sub-runners of area Ad . Conservation of
mass between the upstream and downstream sections provides:

ṁ = ρu vu Au = nρd vd Ad

By assuming constant density and imposing linear velocity, the following relationship be-
tween the upstream and downstream diameters is found:

Du
Dd = √
n
Therefore, the diameter of any runners in the feed system is only a function of the injector
diameter D0 . The value of D0 can be determined by imposing a maximum pressure drop in

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Injection Mold Design

the feed system ∆Pf eed of 50M P a. The pressure loss at the intersections will be neglected,
so only the pressure drop along the runners will be taken into account. This quantity, for a
single runner, is given by:

8 · µmelt · L · V̇melt
∆Pf eed =
π · R4
The point where the maximum pressure drop takes place is a priori unknown, although
it is evident that it must be points A or B (or one of their symmetries). In the previous
expression, the length L of all the runners is already determined and the radii R are known
as a function of the initial diameter D0 . The volume flow rate at each runner is determined
by imposing mass continuity at each intersection and can therefore be written solely as a
function of the volume flow rate of the injector, V̇0 :

V̇u
V̇d =
n

The value of V̇0 is chosen to be 250 · 10−6 m3 /s (slightly higher than the typical value). The
pressure drop at points A and B can now be found as a function of D0 . Recalling that a
maximum pressure loss of 50M P a is acceptable, a minimum value of D0min = 2.23cm is
found.

As discussed earlier, the flow of liquid ABS must be laminar in the feed system. Imposing
Re < 2300 in the feed system might impose a constrain on the volume flow rate V̇ , which was
here freely chosen. However, due to the large viscosity µmelt of ABS, the Reynolds number
of the flow with the chosen parameters is of the order Re 1 at its highest value. Thus, the
laminar flow condition does not in truth constrain the design of the injector system.

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Injection Mold Design

Having found the minimum value for the initial diameter D0min = 2.23cm, the initial diameter
is set to be D0 = 3cm. The total volume of the runners is therefore Vrunners = 1.39 · 10−4 m3 .
The total volume of the molded pieces is approximately Vmoldings = Vpiece · npieces ≈ 3.00 ·
10−6 m3 · 248 = 7.44 · 10−4 m3 . Thus, the scrap-to-piece volume is

Vrunners
ηscrap = · 100 = 15.78%
Vmoldings + Vrunners

4 Separation of the Feed System

In order to allow the molded parts to be separated from the runners, a system must be
designed to hold the runners to the top plate as the spoons are being separated. Firstly,
the force required to break the parts from the runners will be computed. The force needed
to break the spoon-runner joint is that which will force the material to surpass its ultimate
tensile strength:

Fbreak = Aef f · σU T S

The area of the joint can be easily computed from the diameters of the runners (these are
not the same for all spoons; due to the linear velocity constraint, some have a diameter of
1.5mm and other of 1.2mm. However, the calculations will be simplified by considering an
average value of 1.35mm). The value of σU T S for ABS is also known, so the force to break
a single spoon free is:

Fbreak = 57.25N

The total force needen to separate all the spoons is

Fbreak total = Fbreak · nspoons = 14.2kN

The runner system will be held in place by a number of dovetail pins, which must exert a
holding force on the runners higher than the one required to break all the spoons, 14.2kN .
This force will be simplified as the shear force required to cut through the material:

Fhold = τU T S · p · t

Where τU T S is the ultimate tensile shear stress, τU T S ≈ σU T S /2, p is the perimeter of the
dovetail, and t is the thickness of the protusion of the pin. The values of p = 21mm (pin
radius = 4mm) and t = 4mm are chosen, considering that the dovetails must fit within the
dimensions of the runners. Whith these values the holding force per dovetail is

Fhold = 2011N

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Injection Mold Design

And therefore, an appropriate holding force can be obtained by using 8 dovetails:

Fhold total = Fhold · ndovetail = 16.1kN

This force is larger than the one required to separate the molded pieces, which ensures the
proper functionality of the three-plate mold.

5 Cooling system
The heat released by the piece during the solidification and cooling processes of the molten
plastic must be efficiently dissipated by means of a suitable cooling system. Heat transfer
can be a complex phenomen, but for the current purpose many simplifications are going to
be assumed, in order to estimate the main parameters of interest related with the cooling
system by using some simple equations. The fluid used as coolant is water, which properties
are shown in Table 3.

Density, ρcoolant [kg/m3 ] Specific heat, Cp,coolant [J/kg/K] Dynamic viscosity, µcoolant [Pa· s]
1000 4185 4.658·10−4

Table 3: Water properties

The first value to be known is the amount of heat (Q) that is expected to be released by
the plastic (including all the pieces and the complete feed system). Using Equation 1 and
properties in Table 2 this value can be easily computed (Note that the number 4 appearing
in the expression is a safety factor accounting for the additional heat provided to the mold
because of the fact of being permanently connected to the injection system).

Q = 4 · mplastic Cp,ABS (Tmelt − Teject ) (1)

where mplastic stands for the mass of plastic in the mold cavity. An acceptable value for
the ejection temperature (Teject ) may be 59◦ C. The melting temperature (Tmelt ), at which
the material is injected into the mold, can be determined within a certain range (see Table
2) having in mind that too small value may lead to solidification of the plastic before the
total filling of the cavity. On the other hand too high Tmelt would increase the heat to be
dissipated as well as the cooling time, having a detrimental effect on the production rate. A
value of Tmelt equal to 230◦ C has been taken.
The cooling time (tc ) can be approximately computed by the correlations shown in Equations
2 and 3. Apart from the the ejection, melting and coolant (Tcoolant ) temperatures, the time
required to cool down the piece is basically geometrically dependent. Equation 2 corresponds
to strip geometry, while Equation 3 applies to cylindrical geometry.

h2
 
4 Tmelt − Tcoolant
tc = 2 ln · (2)
π · αsteel π Teject − Tcoolant

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Injection Mold Design

ksteel
being h the thickness of the strip and αsteel = ρsteel ·Cp,steel
.

D2
 
Tmelt − Tcoolant
tc = ln 0.692 · (3)
23.1 · αsteel Teject − Tcoolant
being D the diameter of the cylinder.
In the actual mold design two main elements can be found, the spoon cavities and the
runners. The first one can be approximated as a strip (with h = 3mm), while the second is
close to be cylindrically shaped (the greatest runner has D = V ALOR). The cooling time
is limited by the highest of the values obtained from Equations 2 and 3.
Due to the large value of the runner maximum diameter compared to the spoon thickness,
the cooling time is determined by the cooling of the main runner (meter valores de tc,strip y
tc,cylinder ).
The rate at which heat must be dissipated can be now easily computed (Q̇cooling = Q/tc ).
Therefore the heat corresponding to each cooling line is given by Equation 4; where s stands
for the number of cooling lines.

Q 1
Q̇line = · (4)
tc n
The maximum number of cooling lines that can be placed in the mold without interfering
with ejection pins or runners is 16, in the case of the final selected design. Once the number
of lines has been determined the volume flow rate of coolant (V̇coolant ) by performing the
energy balance of a control volume corresponding to a cooling line1 (Equation 5), obtaining
a value V̇coolant = V ALOR. The increment of temperature (∆T ) along the line is limited
due to environmental concerns, and is set to 1◦ C

Q̇line
V̇coolant = (5)
∆Tcoolant · ρcoolant · Cp,coolant

The last parameter to be determine, regarding the cooling system, is the geometry the
cooling lines. As usual in this type systems cylindrical geometries are going to be used. The
considered value for the diameter should guarantee that the flow inside the line is turbulent,
enhancing the convective exchange of heat from the mold to the coolant fluid. This is to
say that the Reynolds Number must be greater than 4000. An exact value of the diameter
is not obtained but a constrain:
4 · ρcoolant · V̇coolant
Dline <
π · µcoolant · 4000
Valor final del diámetro de las cooling lines
In order to avoid defects due to different conditions during the cooling process, the lines
should be arranged as symmetrically as possible. As a final consideration the cooling depth
(Hline ) should have a value 2Dline < Hline < 5Dline .
1
Note that this process could be done in an inverse way, by selecting the desired V̇coolant per line and
then computing Q̇line and the required n

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Injection Mold Design

6 Ejection system
Due to thermal expansion, the injected ABS will shrink inside the mold as it cools. The
mold will also undergo this phenomenon, although in a much less noticeable manner. Here,
a simplification will be made in order to neglect the thermal contraction of the mold. This is
a reasonable assumption since the coefficient of thermal expansion of steel is approximately
seven times lower than that of ABS (αABS = 73.8 · 10−6 K −1 ; αsteel = 12.0 · 10−6 K −1 ).
In convex cavities, the injected piece will contract against the steel mold, exerting a normal
force that will in turn produce a friction force Ff riction = µ · Fnormal . In order to extract the
piece, an ejection system must provide enough force to overcome the friction and separate
the piece from the mold.
The normal force exerted by the piece on the mold is

Fnormal = σ · Aef f ective

where σ can be found with the material’s elastic modulus, E, and the stress due to thermal
expansion as

σ = E · ε = E · αABS · (Tsolidif ication − Tejection )

The only concave cavities on the bottom plate are on the bottom of the spoon handle. This
cavity will be modeled as a rectangular prism of dimensions 58mm × 7.5mm × 2.5mm, where
only the side faces exert a normal force. Thus, the effective area is Aef f = 3.27 · 10−4 m3 .
Given the friction coefficient between ABS and steel, µ = 0.2, the friction force per piece is
found:

Ff riction = 1.75kN

This force must be exerted on each piece by a number of pins in order to free the piece form
the mold. For this mold design, given the high number of pieces being molded at once, a
single pin is chosen for each piece. The pin will be placed on the resultant of the friction
forces in order to ensure a smooth unmolding. The diameter of each pin can be determined
with the condition that the stresses must not surpass the yield stress of the material.

Ff riction
Aminpin =
σysteel

Assuming a circular shape for the ejector pin, the minimum diameter for each pin is found
to be

Dminpin = 7.1mm

This pin size is coherent with the design, since it is smaller than the width of the spoon
cavity.

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Injection Mold Design

7 Venting system

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Injection Mold Design

References

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