Development of a Small-Scale Plastic Injection Mold and Preliminary Performance Evaluation
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Abstract
This research aimed to design and fabricate a small-scale plastic injection mold and evaluate its performance when used with a small-scale plastic injection molding machine. The study also sought to determine suitable operating parameters for the injection molding process using polypropylene (PP) and high-density polyethylene (HDPE) as test materials. The research process consisted of mold design and fabrication, installation of the mold on the injection molding machine, and experimental trials under various temperature conditions. The performance of the mold and molding system was then evaluated to identify appropriate processing parameters.
The fabricated mold had dimensions of 70 mm × 110 mm × 20 mm and successfully produced complete molded parts from both PP and HDPE materials. Experimental results showed that suitable injection pressures were 0.4 MPa for PP and 0.6 MPa for HDPE. The recommended processing conditions included a plastic melting time of 2 minutes, a mold filling time of 10 seconds, and a cooling time of 30 seconds. Appropriate melting temperatures were found to be 170 °C for PP and 180 °C for HDPE.
The findings indicate that the developed mold provides satisfactory performance for prototype production using a small-scale plastic injection molding machine. In addition, the results can serve as preliminary guidelines for selecting process parameters in plastic injection molding and may support educational applications as well as engineering prototype development.
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References
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