Design of Injection Mold from Plastic Material

Abstract

This paper deals with the use of plastics for making injection molds. Mold production times reduced by 90% and costs cut by up to 75% are some of the benefits of prototype molds from plastic materials. Today, materials with melt temperatures above 300 °C are used for plastic molds. They include ABS, PE, PP and PA. In this study, testing of high-temperature resin from Formlabs was performed. Compression and tensile test data are compared with the datasheet values and with virtual simulations. The tests were carried out at different temperatures. Based on their results, one can identify a suitable molding process with molds from this material.

Micro Injection Molding of Thin Cavities Using Stereolithography for Mold Fabrication

“…Good performance was evidenced by Formlabs High Temperature SLA resin, whereas poor properties were measured by ABS and ONYX filaments for FDM. Mechanical properties and tensile and compression limits of some Formlabs SLA resins have been also experimentally verified for mold insert fabrication [ 12 ], showing that the limits can be much lower than those declared by manufacturers in material datasheets. In addition, regarding material performance, the authors in [ 13 ] demonstrated that the design rules of mold inserts and mold assembly setup [ 14 ] are very important to success, avoiding defects and allowing for a high number of shots before mold failure.…”