Professional Documents
Culture Documents
INJECTION MOLD
DESIGN
BDD 40903 Prepared by : Mohd Hilmi Othman 1
CHAPTER 5
Gating Design (4 hours)
• These type of gates require an operator to separate the • These type of gates incorporate features in the tool to
parts from the runners manually after each cycle. break or shear the gates when the tool opens to eject the
Manually trimmed gates are chosen for several reasons: part.
The gate is too bulky to be automatically sheared by the • Automatically trimmed gates are used for several
machine reasons:
• Shear-sensitive materials such as PVC cannot be a) Avoiding gate removal as a secondary operation,
exposed to high shear rates reducing cost
• Flow distribution for certain designs that require b) Maintaining consistent cycle times for all parts
simultaneous flow distribution across a wide front c) Minimizing gate scars on parts
1. Place gates at the heaviest cross section to allow for part packing and minimize voids & sink.
2. Minimize obstructions in the flow path by placing gates away from cores & pins.
3. Be sure that stress from the gate is in an area that will not affect part function or aesthetics.
4. If using a plastic with a high shrink grade, the part may shrink near the gate causing “gate pucker” if
there is high molded-in stress at the gate
5. Be sure to allow for easy manual or automatic degating.
6. Gate should minimize flow path length to avoid cosmetic flow marks.
7. In some cases, it may be necessary to add a second gate to properly fill the parts.
8. If filling problems occur with thin walled parts, add flow channels or make wall thickness adjustments
to correct the flow.
Gates vary in size and shape depending upon the type of plastic being molded and the size of the part. Large
parts will require larger gates to provide a bigger flow of resin to shorten the mold time. Small gates have
a better appearance but take longer time to mold or may need to have higher pressure to fill correctly.
• Fan gate, is a gate spreading toward in to cavity, basically this gate is thin similarly with previous gate
(film gate) and is used in same purpose with film gate.
• With the gate construction it permits rapid filling of large parts or fragile section mold area with large
entry area. it is used to create uniform flow into wide parts.
Dimension
http://mould-technology.blogspot.com/2008/04/film-gate-design-flash-gate.html
BDD 40903 Prepared by : Mohd Hilmi Othman 13
Tunnel gate
• The Sub Gate is the only
automatically trimmed gate on the
list.
• Ejector pins will be necessary for
automatic trimming of this gate.
• Sub gates are quite common and
have several variations such as
banana gate, tunnel gate and smiley
gate to name a few.
• The sub gate allows you to gate
away from the parting line, giving
more flexibility to place the gate at
an optimum location on the part.
• This gate leaves a pin sized scar on
the part.
http://www.moldhotrunnersolutions.com/thermalgating.html
1) Gate should set on the thickest wall position of molding products, make plastic flow from thick-wall
position to thin-wall position to reduce the pressure loss. Melt plastic should take the shortest possible path
(runner), minimal heat and pressure loss, rapid injection to complete the injection process.
2) Gate should be set in the position of products where is most likely to be cleared easily. Try to not affect the
appearance and avoid flow marks (if possible).
3) Gate location should help make the plastic flow on the uniform parallel direction and is positive to assist
air venting.
4) Gate location should set to avoid weld lines, keep clean of the important position of the products, and
avoid to reduce the strength of the products.
5) As to multi-cavity mold, the size and location of the gate should be designed on the distance between the
gate and the runner, on the size of the products .
6) Gate location should avoid directly impact on the thin core, inserts, sliders to prevent possible deformed
products.
7) The consideration of the gate design should involve different shrinkage between the transverse direction
and the longitudinal direction. Temperature and pressure of the melt from each gate into the cavity should
be the same to ensure that the same shrinkage for different cavity filling.
• In the custom injection molding business, margins are extremely tight. This requires the mold maker to
make a very accurate determination of the size and type of gate for the injection mold. The wrong gate can
spell disaster, or at least reworking the mold, which can quickly eat up profits.
• There must be a gazillion plastic parts in the world: cell phones, computers, hula hoops, keyboards, TVs, toy
machine guns, goggles, etc.
• Gates vary in size and shape depending upon the type of plastic being molded and the size and shape of
the part as well. The size, type and placement of the gate used in plastic injection mold making have a
dramatic impact on the quality of the plastic part, as well as how quickly it is produced.
• The primary factor that should be considered include the type of runner system, the desired method of de-
gating, the allowable level of shear rates through the gate and the resulting flow that is desired.
• To facilitate gate location, Table 7.1 provides a summary of the types and properties of common gates.
Source: David O. Kazmer, “Injection Mold Design Engineering”, Carl Hanser Verlag, 2007. (Page 177)
Source: David O. Kazmer, “Injection Mold Design Engineering”, Carl Hanser Verlag, 2007. (Page 179)
Source: David O. Kazmer, “Injection Mold Design Engineering”, Carl Hanser Verlag, 2007. (Page 181)
• The purpose of the gate freeze test is to identify the hold conditions necessary to freeze the gate.
• The extent and duration of hold pressure has a large effect on the dimensional stability and outer appearance
of the molded part.
• If the hold time is too short, the gate will not have had enough time to freeze off and sink marks could
appear on the part.
• This is especially true of larger parts and when higher hold pressures are employed.
• After the mold gates "freeze", hold pressure has no effect and should be terminated at that point.
• It is typically better to be a little high on the hold pressure timer setting.
• This will cause a slight wear increase on the hydraulics of the injection press but the molder will be able to
ensure higher dimensional accuracy.
• Hold pressure is set at a pressure which allows no plastic melt to enter or leave the gate as the part solidifies.
• A high hold pressure setting could pack the part excessively, beyond dimensional tolerances.
• A low hold pressure setting will allow the melt to exit through the gate causing sink marks and voids in the
part.
Notes:
1) When using a valve gated system, no hold time is required. Once the valve is closed, no material will
enter or leave the cavity. The valve is held open long enough to properly pack the part, and then
closed. At this point, no pressure needs to be applied.
2) Having poor shot size control on your molding machine and an imbalanced mold will lead to less than
desired results (lack of precision).
Caution: On some molds, high hold pressure and hold times can cause ejection issues. Pay heed to the
advice of the mold builder and do not increase the hold pressure and time to the point the parts are difficult
to eject off the cores. If you see this issue on your pilot mold, you may want to modify the mold or part
design to make your part ejection more robust.
http://polymerprocessing.blogspot.com/2011/03/7-gate-freeze-test-validation-procedure.html