Tutorials on Injection Mould Designing

Sourbh

19 Sep, 2013 08:19 AM

Today the Topic is Runner's

1. Step 1:

   Cold Runner

   In a cold runner mold, the runner is cooled and ejected with the part. Every cycle, a part and a runner are produced. The obvious disadvantage of this system is the waste plastic generated. The runners are either disposed of, or reground and reprocessed with the original material. This adds a step in the manufacturing process. Also, regrind will increase variation in the injection molding process, and could decrease the plastic's mechanical properties.
   Despite these disadvantages, there are many significant advantages to using a cold runner mold. The mold design is very simple, and much cheaper than a hot runner system. The mold requires less maintenance and less skill to set up and operate. Color changes are also very easy, since all of the plastic in the mold is ejected with each cycle.

2. Step 2:

   Hot Runner

   In a hot runner mold, the runner is situated internally in the mold and kept a temperature above the melting point of the plastic. Runner scrap is reduced or eliminated. The major disadvantages of a hot runner is that it is much more expensive than a cold runner, it requires costly maintenance, and requires more skill to operate. Color changes with hot runner molds can be difficult, since it is virtually impossible to remove all of the plastic from an internal runner system.
   Hot runners have many advantages. They can completely eliminate runner scrap, so there are no runners to sort from the parts, and no runners to throw away or regrind and remix into the original material. Hot runners are popular in high production parts, especially with a lot of cavities.

3. Step 3:

   Types of Cold Runner Molds

   There are two major types of cold runner molds: two plate and three plate.
   A two plate cold runner mold is the simplest type of mold. It is called a two plate mold because there is one parting plane, and the mold splits into two halves. The runner system must be located on this parting plane; thus the part can only be gated on its perimeter.

4. Step 4:

   A three plate mold differs from a two plate in that it has two parting planes, and the mold splits into three sections every time the part is ejected. Since the mold has two parting planes, the runner system can be located on one, and the part on the other. Three plate molds are used because of their flexibility in gating location. A part can be gated virtually anywhere along its surface.

5. Step 5:

   A two plate Cold Runner mould
   

   

6. Step 6:

   A Three Plate Cold Runner mould