Atomatic cooling channels layout of straight cooling pipes in injection molding

摘要

This paper deals with method of automatically arranging cooling channels, which are composed of linear-shaped cooling pipes, in an injection mold. For this study, an autonomous design methodology to automatically arrange curved cooling pipes was suggested and its efficacy was confirmed. This method will be expanded in this paper so as to be applied to a cooling channel with a combination of straight cooling pipes. Then, the method will be examined through a series of numerical experiments. In this study, straight cooling pipes are expressed by arranging in a straight line, lengthwise, a plural number of heat-absorbing elements. A cooling channel is composed of a combination of those pipes. To achieve the desired temperature distribution on the mold cavity surface, the arrangement of the cooling channel is searched through autonomous movement of cooling pipes. This movement will be achieved through translational motion, and expansion/contraction to satisfy the two constraints, the straight shape of cooling pipes and the maintenance of their interconnected relationship.