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Catoen Rees 2021 Injection Mold Design Handbook
Catoen Rees 2021 Injection Mold Design Handbook
Herbert Rees
Bruce Catoen
Injection Mold
Design Handbook
Injection Mold Design Handbook downloaded from www.hanser-elibrary.com by 165.225.121.74 on September 25, 2023
For personal use only.
Injection Mold Design Handbook downloaded from www.hanser-elibrary.com by 165.225.121.74 on September 25, 2023
For personal use only.
Herbert Rees
Bruce Catoen
Injection Mold
Design Handbook
®
MIX
Papier aus verantwor-
tungsvollen Quellen
The use of general descriptive names, trademarks, etc., in this publication, even if the former are not especially
identified, is not to be taken as a sign that such names, as understood by the Trade Marks and Merchandise Marks
Act, may accordingly be used freely by anyone. While the advice and information in this book are believed to be true
and accurate at the date of going to press, neither the authors nor the editors nor the publisher can accept any legal
responsibility for any errors or omissions that may be made. The publisher makes no warranty, express or implied,
with respect to the material contained herein.
The final determination of the suitability of any information for the use contemplated for a given application re-
mains the sole responsibility of the user.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic
or mechanical, including photocopying or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in
writing from the publisher.
Copyright for images provided for this book by companies and other sources remains property of the respective
company. All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-56990-815-0
E-Book ISBN: 978-1-56990-816-7
Preface
Injection Mold Design Handbook downloaded from www.hanser-elibrary.com by 165.225.121.74 on September 25, 2023
From 1990 to 2005 I worked together with Herbert Rees on editing and writing
books and manuals for both Husky Injection Molding Systems, where I worked in
various engineering capacities, and for Hanser Publishers. Herbert was passionate
about molds, design and engineering. As the VP of engineering at Husky during
some of its most formative years, Herbert worked closely with Husky’s founder,
Robert Schad, and together they developed many machine and mold technologies.
Herbert passed away peacefully on Saturday, September 18, 2010, at the age of 95.
Over the years Herbert repeatedly told me that “An injection mold is the heart of
For personal use only.
any plastics molding work cell. Since the objective of every molder is to produce as
many good parts as possible, each and every day they MUST understand the pro-
cess and details of designing an injection mold”. Throughout my career I have seen
this proven true again and again. Understanding the principles of an injection
mold design is fundamental to the success of the molded product and the molding
operation.
Mold design encompasses every aspect of mechanical engineering including dy-
namics, statics, thermodynamics, materials, heat transfer and stress. As a result of
its broad application of engineering principles it is a difficult subject to master and
it results in a long learning curve for engineers. Much of the learning I received
during my career was tribal knowledge based on the application of engineering
principles. Gaining this knowledge took being in the right place at the right time
or learning by trial and error. My hope is that this book helps short-circuit the
process of learning good mold design practices.
This book is designed to be a reference handbook for the mold designer, engineer,
project manager and production manager. Since designing an injection mold all
starts with the plastic part, the book will first focus on key features and details of
plastics and the plastic part which are necessary for good mold design. The design
of the main components of an injection mold will be discussed and good design
practices, rules of thumb, and key calculations will be shared. More than 600 fig-
ures, images and tables are provided in the book to illustrate how a mold should
be designed. Chapter 18 contains more than 40 reference mold designs graciously
VI Preface
provided by mold-makers around the world. These references reinforce the previ-
ous chapters and illustrate how to apply the guidelines and principles from the
book into a completed mold design. Finally, the process of testing and gaining cus-
tomer acceptance of the mold for production will be detailed.
By using this book as a reference guide, the reader will be able to refer to it as
needed to understand:
Critical mold design features and design practices that will ensure a success-
ful plastic part is molded
Injection Mold Design Handbook downloaded from www.hanser-elibrary.com by 165.225.121.74 on September 25, 2023
There are many people who helped put this book together, and I am so grateful for
the time and materials that were provided to me. I would like to thank my editors
and reviewers: Mark Smith from Hanser; Glenn Anderson for reviewing Chapter 5
and his contacts throughout the industry; Dr. Davide Masato, Assistant Professor
at University of Massachusetts Lowell, for reviewing Chapter 11 on ejection and
Chapter 12 on cooling, as well as his additional contributions on surface finishes;
Fabrice Fairy for reviewing Chapter 14 on melt distribution and his boundless
enthusiasm for hot runners; Vince Travaglini for reviewing Chapter 2 on part de-
sign and the tremendous help from StackTeck Systems; Vince Lomax for reviewing
For personal use only.
Chapters 9, 10, and 11, his wisdom, and the additional materials he provided on
mold testing and alignment; Jordan Robertson for reviewing Chapter 5; Randy
Yakimishyn for reviewing Chapters 9 and 10; Rocky Huber for reviewing Chapter
11 on ejection; Don Smith for reviewing Chapters 11 and 12 and the reference
mold designs in Chapter 18; Christian Krammer for reviewing Chapter 19 and the
checklists; and Dr. David Barden from Clearly Scientific Limited for his excellent
edits and suggestions. Thanks to Christina Fuges for her help in connecting me
with mold-makers and other industry experts to review the materials in the book.
The book would not be what it is without the generous support of the many
mold-makers, hot runner suppliers, software providers, and machine manufactur-
ers for the use of their mold designs, figures and pictures. I would like to thank:
Gene Altonen CTO of IMFLUX; Paulo Silva, Managing Director of Plasdan; Mario
Haidlmair, CEO of Haidlmair; Adam Chuickshank, CEO of Fourmark; Peter Smith,
CEO of DME; Vince Travaglini, President of StackTeck Systems; Rui Tocha, the
Director General of Centimfe; Oliver Lindenberg, VP of Global Sales Moldmasters;
Andy Stirn, VP of Injection Machinery and Aftermarket NA Milacron; Mike Ellis,
Global Business Manager for Hot Runners at Husky Injection Molding Systems;
Miki Bogar, Senior Manager of Global Marketing at Mold-Masters; Andreas Kliber,
GM of FDU Hotrunner; Stefan Von Buren, GM of MHS; Angela Vitz-Schiergens,
VP Hotset; and Don Smith.
VIII Acknowledgments
I am very grateful for all the time and effort it took to provide high-resolution
drawings and figures with explanations. In particular, I want to thank: Alberto
Silva at Plasdan; Fabio Och at Fourmark; Beth Thompson at DME; Jordan Robertson
at StackTeck; Peter Peschl at Haidlmair; Sylvia Schmidt from Hotset; Rob Irwin at
Nypro Mold; and Brenton Huxel at iMFLUX. I would also like to thank Anthony
Yang and Srikar Vallury at Moldex3D for the use of figures from the Molding
Simulation book.
Very special thanks to Jigish Shah, who provided much needed assistance with the
creation of many figures for the book.
Injection Mold Design Handbook downloaded from www.hanser-elibrary.com by 165.225.121.74 on September 25, 2023
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . V
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . VII
The Author . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . IX
1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.1 Benefits of Injection Molding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
For personal use only.
11 Ejection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 293
11.1 Manual or Semi-Automatic Ejection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 294
11.2 Automatic Ejection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 295
11.3 Basic Requirements for Ejection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
11.3.1 Machine Opening Stroke for Ejection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 297
11.3.2 Venting for Ease of Ejection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 300
11.3.3 Surface Finish Forces on Ejection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
11.3.3.1 Mold Surface Roughness . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301
11.3.3.2 Molding Surface Finish Guidelines for Ejection . . . 302
11.4 Force Required for Ejection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303
Contents XIX
16 Fasteners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 565
16.1 How Screws Work . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 567
16.2 Rolled versus Cut Threads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 568
16.3 Holding Action and Preload of Screws . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 569
16.4 Influence of Temperature on Screws . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 573
16.5 Effect of Cyclical Loads on Screws . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 574
16.6 Screw Standards and Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 574
Injection Mold Design Handbook downloaded from www.hanser-elibrary.com by 165.225.121.74 on September 25, 2023
20 Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 733
Appendix 1: Mold Material Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 733
Appendix 2: Frequently Used Conversion Factors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 735
Appendix 3: Plastics and their Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 737
Appendix 4: Mold Design Review Checklist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 739
Injection Mold Design Handbook downloaded from www.hanser-elibrary.com by 165.225.121.74 on September 25, 2023
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 769