Thermal-stress analysis of vulcanization molds to determine the dilatation gap between aluminum segments

Abstract

The aim of the paper is to present a methodology for calculating the gap between segments of a tire vulcanizing mold in order to prevent rubber from flowing out of the mold when heated to 165 °C. The analysis will be performed for four types of molds for the manufacturing of tires for passenger cars. Segments for containers K1 to K4 with their minimum and maximum dimensions were selected for analysis. Deformation values in radial and tangential directions for all four segment types were evaluated by computational analysis. The finite element method (FEM) was used for the analysis using the ANSYS computational program. The calculation was made on the finite-element models of the aluminum segment, its carrier and the tightening ring. The boundary conditions were selected for each load case to really characterize the physical phenomenon.