Flow Disturbance Characterization of Highly Filled Thermoset Injection Molding Compounds behind an Obstacle and in a Spiral Flow Part

Abstract

In the injection molding process, weld line regions occur when a molten polymer flow front is first separated and then rejoined. The position, length, and angle of weld lines are dependent on the gate location, injection speed, injection pressure, mold temperature, and, especially, the direction and degree of the polymer melt velocity in the mold-filling process. However, the wall surface velocity of the thermoset melt in the mold-filling process is not zero, which is not found for thermoplastic injection molding. The main reason leading to this difference is the slip phenomenon in the filling phase between the thermoset melt and the wall surface, which is directly affected by the filler content. In this study, commercial thermoset phenolic injection molding compounds with different amounts of filler were employed to investigate not only the mechanism of weld line formation and development behind an obstacle in the injection molding process but also the flow disturbance of the thermoset melt in the spiral flow part. In addition, the effect of the wall slip phenomenon on the flow disturbance characterization and the mechanism of weld lines of selected thermoset materials was carefully considered in this research. Furthermore, the generated material data sheet with the optimal developed reactive viscosity and curing kinetics model was imported into a commercial injection molding tool to predict the weld line formation as well as the mold-filling behavior of selected thermoset injection molding compounds, such as the flow length, cavity pressure profile, temperature distribution, and viscosity variation. The results obtained in this paper provide important academic knowledge about the flow disturbance behavior as well as its influence on the mechanism of weld line formation in the process of thermoset injection molding. Furthermore, the simulated results were compared with the experimental results, which helps provide an overview of the ability of computer simulation in the field of the reactive injection molding process.