Adaptive process control of the changeover point for injection molding process

Abstract

To increase the productivity of injection molding machines, we developed a smart injection part weight stability control system based on C++ programming and domain knowledge. The proposed system is meant to eliminate variability in the quality of injected parts by adjusting the changeover position. We developed a viscosity index based on melt pressure data related to guide the adjustment to the changeover position in accordance with material properties. This was achieved by mounting a pressure sensor on the nozzle of the injection molding machine to enable the on-line monitoring of pressure throughout the injection molding process. A series of experiments was conducted to characterize the relationship between viscosity index and injection-molded samples in order to validate the efficacy of the proposed injection stability system. Single-factor experiments were conducted with the changeover position and melt temperature as parameters. The quality of the molded samples obtained under different process parameters was evaluated in terms of weight. Experiment results revealed a correlation between changes in viscosity index and changes in the weight of the samples. The injection stability system can also be operated in self-adjusting mode, in which the changeover position is varied according to viscosity index. In experiments, abnormal machine operations prompted the adjustment of changeover position. Variation in the weight of parts was used to define an index to validate the efficacy of the proposed system.