Automatic layout design of plastic injection mould cooling system
TL;DR: This research extends the previous investigation of the automation of the preliminary design stage to the layout design stage of the cooling system design process, and develops a framework for fuzzy evaluation of the layout designs to rate the various design alternatives generated.
Abstract: This research extends our previous investigation of the automation of the preliminary design stage to the layout design stage of the cooling system design process. While the functional aspects of the cooling system are considered during the preliminary design stage, the layout design stage addresses both the functionality and manufacturability of the design. A graph structure is devised to capture a given preliminary design and a graph traversal algorithm is developed to generate candidate cooling circuits from the graph structure. Heuristic search is employed to develop the cooling circuits into the layout designs by generation of tentative manufacturing plans. A framework for fuzzy evaluation of the layout designs is developed to rate the various design alternatives generated. An experimental system is implemented to verify the feasibility of the approach, and examples generated from the system are presented to illustrate the major steps of the automatic design process.
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TL;DR: A decision-making methodology based on data envelopment analysis (DEA) is presented, which uses both quantitative and qualitative criteria, for evaluating FLD, and is applied to a real data set of a case study.
250 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the performance of injection molding (IM) tools with conformal cooling channels has been evaluated using numerical modeling software originally developed for conventionally cooled mould designs, with a focus on material properties of tool steels.
Abstract: Additive manufacturing (AM) techniques such as selective laser melting (SLM) can enable the construction of injection moulding (IM) tools with conformal cooling channels that significantly improve performance through higher cooling uniformity and reduced cycle times. Design of IM cooling systems is typically achieved using commercial IM numerical modelling software originally developed for conventionally cooled mould designs. However, the accuracy of IM modelling software in predicting the performance of SLM manufactured tools with conformal cooling, across a range of moulding materials and processing conditions, has not been thoroughly evaluated in the literature. Furthermore, the SLM manufacturability and mechanical properties of tool steels typically applied in IM, such as AISI H13, are not well documented. This work addresses these deficiencies through the following: quantification of SLM H13 material properties, in particular fatigue strength which has not been previously reported; design and manufacture of a mould tool with easily exchangeable conventionally and conformally cooled inserts; and subsequent experimental validation of IM simulation software predictions under a range conditions. Result of mechanical testing showed SLM H13 parts to offer lower mechanical properties in the as-built condition compared to conventional materials; however, these increased substantially following residual stress reduction with heat treatment. Evaluation of the temperature prediction accuracy of IM numerical models showed generally high accuracy for conformally cooled SLM tools, although marginally lower when compared to conventionally cooled moulds. The outcomes of this work offer designers typical material property data for SLM manufactured H13 tooling, as well as an indication of the expected prediction accuracy of current commercial IM simulation software when applied to conformally cooled SLM tooling.
135 citations
TL;DR: This paper reviews emerging concurrent and collaborative engineering approaches and emphasizes on the integration of different application systems across product life cycle management stages and a new paradigm of research from the angle of feature unification and association for product modeling and manufacturing is subsequently proposed.
Abstract: With widely used concurrent and collaborative engineering technologies, the validity and consistency of product information become important. In order to establish the state of the art, this paper reviews emerging concurrent and collaborative engineering approaches and emphasizes on the integration of different application systems across product life cycle management (PLM) stages. It is revealed that checking product information validity is difficult for the current computer-aided systems because engineering intent is at best partially represented in product models. It is also not easy to maintain the consistency among related product models because information associations are not established. The purpose of this review is to identify and analyze research issues with respect to information integration and sharing for future concurrent and collaborative engineering. A new paradigm of research from the angle of feature unification and association for product modeling and manufacturing is subsequently proposed.
94 citations
Cites background from "Automatic layout design of plastic ..."
...This approach is motivated by the globalization of economy and boosted by the developments of supply chain (Chopra and Meindl 2007) and the Internet (Fuh and Li 2005; Yang and Xue 2003; Wang et al. 2002)....
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...Most research on manufacturability or assemblibility analysis is in this category, such as machining feasibility, complexity analysis, interference checking, or moldability evaluation (Ong and Chew 2000; Chen et al. 2002; Li 2005; Lockett and Guenov 2005)....
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...…Engineering intent of the used form features are not well specified Han and Requicha 1998; Ong and Chew 2000; Chen et al. 2002; Stefano et al. 2004; Li 2005; Lockett and Guenov 2005 CAE analysis Portions of a component, which are significant in a particular type of analysis Solid, surface,…...
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...ysis, interference checking, or moldability evaluation (Ong and Chew 2000; Chen et al. 2002; Li 2005; Lockett and Guenov 2005)....
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TL;DR: Conformal cooling (CC) channels as discussed by the authors are a series of cooling channels that are equidistant from the mold cavity surfaces, they can provide more uniform and efficient cooling effects and thus improve the production quality and efficiency significantly.
68 citations
TL;DR: The cooling system of an injection mould is very important to the productivity of the injection moulding process and the quality of the moulded part and special techniques that allow C-space computation and storage in three-dimensional or lower dimension are developed.
Abstract: The cooling system of an injection mould is very important to the productivity of the injection moulding process and the quality of the moulded part. Despite the various research efforts that have been directed towards the analysis, optimization, and fabrication of cooling systems, support for the layout design of the cooling system has not been well developed. In the layout design phase, a major concern is the feasibility of building the cooling system inside the mould insert without interfering with the other mould components. This paper reports a configuration space (C-space) method to address this important issue. While a high-dimensional C-space is generally required to deal with a complex system such as a cooling system, the special characteristics of cooling system design are exploited in the present study, and special techniques that allow C-space computation and storage in three-dimensional or lower dimension are developed. This new method is an improvement on the heuristic method developed previously by the authors, because the C-space representation enables an automatic layout design system to conduct a more systematic search among all of the feasible designs. A simple genetic algorithm is implemented and integrated with the C-space representation to automatically generate candidate layout designs. Design examples generated by the genetic algorithm are given to demonstrate the feasibility of the method.
47 citations
Cites methods from "Automatic layout design of plastic ..."
...Instead of using heuristic rules to generate layout designs, as in the automatic layout design system developed previously by the authors [13,14], this new C-space method enables an automatic layout design system to conduct a more systematic search among all of the feasible layout designs....
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...This new method overcomes the limitation of relying on specific heuristics to generate the layout design, as in our previous method [13,14]....
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...The fuzzy evaluation method developed in our previous research [13,14] is used to perform fast evaluation of the fitness of the candidate design that corresponds to a chromosome....
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References
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Book•
01 Jan 2011
TL;DR: This book effectively constitutes a detailed annotated bibliography in quasitextbook style of the some thousand contributions deemed by Messrs. Dubois and Prade to belong to the area of fuzzy set theory and its applications or interactions in a wide spectrum of scientific disciplines.
Abstract: (1982). Fuzzy Sets and Systems — Theory and Applications. Journal of the Operational Research Society: Vol. 33, No. 2, pp. 198-198.
5,861 citations
TL;DR: A computational algorithm based on the α-cut representation of fuzzy sets and interval analysis is described which provides a discrete but exact solution to extended algebraic operations in a very efficient and simple manner.
540 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a tooling set was created to mold a split ring shape and conformal cooling channels were placed in both the cavity and core sides of the tool, and a 2D finite difference model accurately captured the observed temperature histories of the mold.
Abstract: A Solid Freeform Fabrication Process called Three Dimensional Printing is applied to the fabrication of injection molding tooling with cooling channels which are conformal to the molding cavity. The tool is created by spreading layers of stainless steel powder and selectviely joining the powder in the layers by ink-jet printing of a binder material. Unbound powder is removed from without and within the green part thus defined. The green part is sintered and infiltrated with a copper alloy to produce a fully dense tool. The infiltrant is kept out of the cooling channels by elevating the tool above the free surface of the pool of infiltrant in the crucible, thus creating a controlled negative pressure within the infiltrant. An upper limit to the separation of tooling cavity and cooling channel was derived based on transient heat transfer considerations. A tooling set was created to mold a split ring shape and conformal cooling channels were placed in both the cavity and core sides of the tool. The performance of this tool was compared against the performance of a tooling set with straight cooling channels. Thermocouples buried in the core and cavity showed that the conformal tool had no period of transient behavior at the start of molding, while the tool with straight channels took 10–15 cycles to come to an equilibrium temperature some 40°C above the temperature of the coolant. The conformal tool was also found to maintain a more uniform temperature within the tool during an individual molding cycle. The gap in the molded split rings did not change from cycle to cycle with the conformal tool, while it did with the conventional tool. A 2-D finite difference model accurately captured the observed temperature histories of the mold with conformal cooling channels.
265 citations
TL;DR: A survey of state-of-the-art automated manufacturability analysis can be found in this paper, where the authors present the historical context in which this area has emerged and outline characteristics to compare and classify various systems.
Abstract: In the market-place of the 21st century, there is no place for traditional ‘over-the-wall’ communications between design and manufacturing. In order to ‘design it right the very first time’, designers must ensure that their products are both functional and easy to manufacture. Software tools have had some successes in reducing the barriers between design and manufacturing. Manufacturability analysis systems are emerging as one such tool — enabling identification of potential manufacturing problems during the design phase and providing suggestions to designers on how to eliminate them. In this paper, we provide a survey of current state-of-the-art automated manufacturability analysis. We present the historical context in which this area has emerged and outline characteristics to compare and classify various systems. We describe the two dominant approaches to automated manufacturability analysis and overview representative systems based on their application domain. We describe support tools that enhance the effectiveness of manufacturability analysis systems. Finally, we attempt to expose some of the existing research challenges and future directions.
170 citations