# Design of Tread Flange Injection Mold Based on Pro/E

Huilan Zhou

► To cite this version:

Huilan Zhou. Design of Tread Flange Injection Mold Based on Pro/E. 4th Conference on Computer and Computing Technologies in Agriculture (CCTA), Oct 2010, Nanchang, China. pp.555-562, 10.1007/978-3-642-18369-0_66. hal-01564861

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Submitted on 19 Jul 2017

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<figure><img src="image_1.png" /></figure>

Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
# Design of Tread Flange Injection Mold Based On Pro/E

Huilan Zhou

Key Laboratory of Ministry of Education for Conveyance and Equipment, East China
Jiaotong University, Nanchang, Jiangxi 330013
hlanz@tom.com

**Abstract.** In the paper, analyzing the tread flange structure characteristics, its injection mold is designed and the maneuvering tread demolding way is applied to get out flang tread. When designing demolding parts, hydraulic pressure motor and chain-gear mechanism are used. Besides, parting plane and the forming parts can be gained automatically in Pro/E(Pro/Engineer Wildfire3.0) and standard moldbase can be achieved by EMX4.1 including gating, cooling, and guiding system, etc. The designing ways and structure is proved rational and can be taken as reference for the similar injection mold especially for those with longer tread.

**Key words:** tread flange, maneuvering tread demolding way, Pro/E; EMX4.1

## 1. Introduction

For plastic parts, many have thread with them, and it's most critical how to design its automatic tread demolding as the tread demolding structure will effect the mold life and the plastic part quality directly. How to simplify the mold and prolong its life needs to be considered in designing. Besides, with wide application, rapid updating and high quality of plastic parts, digital designing ways such as CAD tools are used in the mold designing and manufacturing in many fields. Among those tools, Pro/E and UG are used most widely. These two softwares have become standard ones in the mold industry of many countries. In the paper, the tread flange injection mold design based on Pro/E is introduced.

## 2. Tread Flange Structure and Process Analysis

The tread flange's size is 60mm 70mm 20mm with 12mm external tread, and it has five pleurotus around which can prevent part from rotating in tread demolding shown in Fig.1.
<figure><img src="image_2.png" /><figcaption>(a) plastic part diagram (b)3D diagram
Fig.1 tread flange</figcaption></figure>

Tread flange's material is PP(Polypropylene)[1-3] with mass production. PP is a kind of material with following character: density 0.90 ~ 0.91g/cm3, melting point 164 ~ 170 °C. PP also has good heat resistance, fine flow performance, less shrinkage and smooth surface.

### 3. the Mold Parting Plane Design

The mold parting plane is generally utilized to separate workpiece or block into mold forming parts, which is composed of a surface or several surfaces. It's important to create correct parting plane and use it to obtain mold forming parts such as cavity, core and pins in mold designing in Pro/E.

For tread flange, after using Pro/E to create its parting plane and separating workpiece with it, the tread flange mold forming parts can be achieved following in Fig.2.

<figure><img src="image_3.png" /><figcaption>(a)fixed plate (b)mobile plate (c)mold core (d)mold cavity
Fig.2 the mold forming parts</figcaption></figure>
# 4 the Injection Mold Design

## 4.1 the Mold Overall Structure

The mold overall structure is shown in Fig.3. As the tread flange has greater total

<figure><img src="image_4.png" /><figcaption>(a)main view</figcaption></figure>

<figure><img src="image_5.png" /><figcaption>(b)left view</figcaption></figure>

1- movable base plate 2- Screw3-supporting plate 4-chain5- Sprocket I6- hydraulic Motor7-pin8- Screw2 9- Guide column10- guide sleeve11- fixed base plate 12- Determined distance pole13- Screw314fixing plate15- Spring16-closing mold tool17-resisting
plate18-separating water plate19-up mold core 20-water mouth21-fixed plate22-fixed mold plate 23-movable plate 24 screw core25-gear26-movable mold plate 27- Sleeve 28-bearing 29-bearing cover 30-seals31-Seal adhesive32- Sleeve2 33-Sprocket 34-Key 35-briquetting 36-screw4 37-Guide column38- guide sleeve 39-Gate sets 40-pulling pole41-screw4

Fig.3 overall structure of the mold

length and longer external tread, some difficulty will confront in its designing and manufacturing, among which separating mechanism according to distance and auto tread demolding must be resolved in designing.

## 4.2 Injection Machine Selection

With calculating tools in Pro/E, the tread flange's total volume including gating system and the plastic part itself can be calculated as 111.822 cm³. Apart from that, considering clamping force and opening stroke, the injecting machine G54-S200/400 is selected, whose Specifications is following:

- Rated injection volume/cm3 : 200-400

- Screw diameter/mm : 55

- Injection pressure/MPA : 109

- Injection stroke/mm : 160

- Clamping force /KN : 2540

- Maximum molding area/cm2 : 645

- Maximum die plate stroke/mm : 260

- Maximum die thickness/mm : 406

- Minimality die thickness/mm : 165

- Sprue circle radius/mm : 18

- Sprue diameter/mm : 4

## 4.3 the Maneuvering Tread Demolding Structure Design

There are three common methods for tread demolding: manual tread demolding, forcing tread demolding and auto tread demolding. For those plastic parts of high quality with mass production, auto tread demolding ways which include maneuvering demolding, half-sliding demolding and combined mold demolding can be applied. In the tread flange mold, maneuvering tread demolding is selected.

The maneuvering tread demolding has the advantage of high efficiency and steady, and in designing, its feasibility, stability and wearing property must be considered seriously and resolved successfully.

AS the tread flange has greater total length and longer external tread, when maneuvering tread demolding, if the traditional rack and pinion is applied, problems must occur in designing and manufacturing as its opening distance is too long. So in the mold, hydraulic pressure motor and chain-gear mechanism are selected in demolding agency. Compared with electric motor, hydraulic pressure motor is more steady, lower noise, and stepless speed regulation. And compared with belt drive, chain drive has
nonslipping with good transmitting ratio, small tension, and small load played on axis.
Now hydraulic pressure motor and chain-gear mechanism have become a more
popularized thread demolding agency.

4.3.1 the Transmission Mechanism$^{[4]}$ Design

The main chain-gear transmission diagram in the mold is in Fig.4.

<figure><img src="image_6.png" /><figcaption>Fig.4 chain-gear transmission diagram</figcaption></figure>

(1) The gear parameter design

In the moldbase of tread flange, the center distance between two gearing shafts is
120mm, and the main gear parameters are following:

Diametrical pitch/mm: 2.5

Tooth number: z1=28 , z2=20

Pitch circle diameter/mm: D1=70, D2=50

Gear width/mm: B1 = 20, B2=30

(2) Bearing selection

Axis with parts on it is located by bearing and bearing cover in axial and radial
directions for the stability.

According to the force loaded on the axis ,the deep groove ball bearing 61805 is
selected in the design.

( 3 ) Chain transmission parameter

According to reference [5], the plastic part enveloping force can be calculated as
following: F=28.1KN.

Considering the enveloping force on the core coming from the plastic part, the
chain 16B in GB/T 1243-1997 is selected whose tensile load is 60KN and pitch 25.4mm
with single row and short pitch.

The parameters of the Sprocket in the mold is designed as: z3=54 ,z4=20.

( 4 ) The transmission ration calculation

As the total thread's length is 12mm, and thread pitch is 1.5mm, so the thread
number can be calculated as 8.

The formular of overall ratio is next:

$$
i = \left( \frac{z2}{z1} \right) \left( \frac{z4}{z3} \right) \approx 0.26 \qquad (1)
$$

In the formula, the meanings of z1,z2,z3 and z4 are shown in Fig.4.It can be
illustrated from the formula (1) that in order to pull the thread out of the core
thoroughly the gear must be driven by the hydraulic pressure motor to work at least 32 rounds.

### 4.3.2 Hydraulic Pressure Motor Selection

Considering the plastic part previous enveloping force, and after composite calculating, the hydraulic pressure motor Nmh1-163 is selected, whose Specifications are next:

- Rating torque/ n.m: 225

- Wept volume/ ml/r: 64

- rated pressure/ mpa: 25

- rated torque/ n.m: 472

- speed range/ r/min: 15-1500

- weight/ kg: 20

Besides, in order to protect the thread from being broken, it is better to run the hydraulic pressure motor slowly.

### 4.4. Separating Mechanism According to Distance and Mold Working Process

Three plates mod is adopted shown in Fig.3, in which the hydraulic pressure motor and chain-gear mechanism are used to realize auto thread demolding. The mold primary working process is as following: at first, after mold being closed and cavity being filled fully, the parting plane I opens and the pin point gate separates from the plastic part under the action of spring 15; secondly, with the help of the die locker 16, the parting plane II can be ensured to be opened before the parting plane III, as a result cooling slag of the runner can be get out; finally, under the action of separating mechanism, movable mold can be separated totally from fixed one and then the cooled plastic part will be removed from core in movable side by motor-chain-gear mechanism.

## 5. the Moldbase Design

Most of injection moldbase have already been standardized. From standardized moldbase loading, sliding-block creating to casting system designing, and from ejecting mechanism to cooling system, all of them could be achieved in standardized moldbase. EMX(Expert Moldbase Extension)4.1 is such a tool, which is a plug-in belongs to Pro/E and can be used to design standard moldbase parts such as mold plate, sliding block, pin and cooling system and so on. Besides, emulation of mold opening and interference checking can also be realized in EMX 4.1[6,7].

The moldbase main designing steps in EMX4.1 are as following:

(1) Assemble the forming parts such as mold core, cavity and sliding block into the moldbase so that EMX4.1 can identify them;

(2) Definite mold subassembly including moldbase type selection, the mold plate dimension, mold layout, locating ring and sprue bush;

(3) Design the gating system. The sprue runner, sub-runner and gate can be
quickly achieved in EMX4.1 using standard runner tool;

(4) Design sliding block mechanism including outside core-pulling and inner side core-drawing mechanism;

(5) Design ejector mechanism. As the hydraulic pressure motor and chain-gear mechanism are used to realize auto thread demolding, ejector mechanism needn't be designed in the tread frange mold;

(6) Design cooling system. After cooling waterline has been drawn in the cooled parts, cooling system can be gained automatically using EMX's gating tool.

(7) Assemble moldbase. Assemble all the parts achieved previously to the moldbase, shown in Fig.5.

<figure><img src="image_7.png" /><figcaption>Fig.5 moldbase</figcaption></figure>

## 6. Conclusions

(1) In the mold, the hydraulic pressure motor and chain-gear mechanism are applied to realize maneuvering thread demolding successfully. Compared with other mechanism, this kind of mechanism can work accurately and stable for demolding, with low noise, good quality and high efficiency.

(2) The CAD technology has been used in the mold and moldbase design by means of Pro/E and EMX4.1, thus the cycle of developing a new part can be shorten rapidly and the mold costs in designing and manufacturing can be reduced greatly.

The maneuvering thread demolding way and CAD technology in the mold designing can be considered as a successful example for other similar mold with tread structure.

## References

1. Shen-Zhang Hong: Practical Mold Design And Injection, Machinery Industry Press, Beijing(2006)

2. Hua-Chang Qu: Injection Mold Design And Molding Process. Higher Education Press, Beijing (2001)
3. the writers of Manual Of Injection Mold: Manual of Injection Mold, Machinery Industry Press, Beijing (2000)

4. Jia-Di Hong, Ming Li, Xin-Yuan Huang: Guide of Mechanical Design, Nanchang University Press, Jiangxi (2001)

5. Gen-Mao Dang, Zhi-Bin Luo, Ji-Ren Li: Mold Design And Manufacture, Xidian University Press, Xi'an, China (1995)

6. Qian Xiao, Hui-Lan Zhou: Practical teaching of Mold Design and Manufacture In Chinese With Pro/Engineer Wildfire3.0, China Electric Power Press, Beijing (2008)

7. Jie-hua HUA, "Quick Design of Injection Mold based on Pro/E", Die & Mould Manufacture, p12~15, (2006)