Mold System Helps Automotive Molder Reduce Scrap by 85%
Canadian Plastics
Automotive supplier Ventra Plastics recently teamed up with CAE Services, a Chicago-based engineering services firm, on a project that reduced Ventra's injection molded scrap by 85%. Ventra achieved this significant scrap reduction after installin...
Automotive supplier Ventra Plastics recently teamed up with CAE Services, a Chicago-based engineering services firm, on a project that reduced Ventra’s injection molded scrap by 85%. Ventra achieved this significant scrap reduction after installing CAE’s Mold-Vac 10,000 system, a mold evacuation product designed to eliminate entrapped air and gas within a mold cavity prior to and during plastic injection molding.
The project was initiated and supervised by Ventra process engineer Frank Massimino, at the company’s Peterborough, ON facility. Massimino had read an article describing how Motorola used Mold-Vac 10,000 to maintain the company’s Six Sigma quality standards in the molding of thin-walled telecommunications components and decided to contact CAE Services. At the time, Massimino was working to reduce rejects of an interior trim component molded from a filled TPO material. The part has a narrow processing window that depends on a numbers of parameters, including heat profile of the barrel, mold temperature and fill speed. Despite attempts to tweak the process, production continued to produce parts with unacceptable gas burns and knit lines.
CAE’s engineering team evaluated the Ventra part and determined that the gas-trap location made the process a candidate for Mold-Vac 10,000. The system was installed, widening the processing window. One year after installation, reject rates on the part have been reduced from 15% to less than 1%. Additionally, Ventra’s mold maintenance costs have been significantly reduced.
“Mold-Vac’s unique blow-back control feature ensures that the vented pins are cleaned and purged after every cycle,” said Massimino. “After installing Mold-Vac, we immediately noticed less build-up of volatiles on ejector pins and around part periphery. The vents on the mold required less cleaning, and as a result we’ve been able to reduce our monthly preventative maintenance.”
A slight modification of the mold is required to use Mold-Vac. Ventra installed a rubber seal around the parting line in order to evacuate all gas from the core and cavity. Massimino foresees other applications for Mold-Vac in the plant, and is currently using the portable system to trouble-shoot other processes and new programs.
“I can identify blind areas in the design process which are difficult to see until we undertake a first shot.”
CAE Services Corp. 630-761-9898
