Understanding Injection Molding of Thermoplastics

The key to optimum plastic part design

A two-days BIMS Training Seminar.
Conducted by professor Vito LEO, the BIMS-SEMINARS sprl.
8^th and 9^th March 2012 at Comwell Roskilde.

The language is English.

- Seminar time schedule
- Practical information
- Prel. list of participants

Update 3rd of February: The course is fully booked.
New registrations will be put on a waiting list, and will be informed if a possibility to attend will arise. If we see sufficient interest we possibly will set-up a second session rapidly.

News in recent seminars
Please note that following our contract with Moldflow, the second afternoon will be entirely devoted to a highly interactive session in small groups around a practical example.
The Moldflow software will be used live to analyze the proposals of the different groups, illustrating in a very dynamic way the key learnings of the session.
We are entirely committed to continually improve our unique training seminar for the benefit of the injection molding community. We strongly advise participants that participated several years ago to join us again for a vastly improved and extended seminar with this new highly interactive final session in the second afternoon.

Seminar's Scope
This seminar will focus on complex phenomena behind the Injection Molding process, with strong emphasis on the understanding of part's problems (aspect, shrinkage, warpage, weld lines, burns, ...) and their relationship to material properties (amorphous, semi-cystalline, filled, unfilled) and the process itself.

The participants we expect could be :

• design engineers in charge of molded parts
• mold making specialists
• molders
• flow analysts looking for analysis interpretation support
• project leaders involved in developing molded parts
• research engineers interested in injection molding
• mechanical engineers interested in process induced weakness and strength
• material engineers or designers whishing to improve their understanding of a given class of materials (i.e. glass fiber filled polymers).
• students involved in the field
• young, skilled professionals with little field experience
• flow analysis developers
• customer support engineers
• ...

The BIMS 2-day seminar content

• Basic polymer thermal and rheological behaviour.
• Effect of pressure on polymer properties.
• The flow process in Injection Molding.
• Part geometry and flow pattern.
• Compressibility, phase change and PVT data.
• What is crystallinity and how does it affect processing?
• The packing phase: key to the dimensional quality of the part.
• Effective part, mould and process design for proper cavity packing.
• Understanding the shrinkage build-up.
• Part warpage mechanisms: designing for minimum warpage, according to material properties and part shape.
• Warpage: the special case of fibre filled materials.
• The concept of residual stresses: the compromise with warpage.
• Final conclusions and wrap-up - Seminar evaluation by the participants.

The seminar is not specifically about Injection Molding Simulation. However, the intention is to clearly help those among the participants who are "Flow Analysis users" to gain a thorough understanding of the concepts that form the basis of existing code. Model assumptions and corresponding limitations will be highlighted and discussed.

The seminar will be highly interactive, with limited attendance, allowing for questions, group discussion and analysis of the attendant problems. Parts or drawings are welcome for open discussion, when possible.

The first part of the seminar will quickly describe the process cycle for the purpose of setting up a common vocabulary.

The seminar may not fit the needs of beginners in the field.

More information on detailed content and the questions to be discussed and answered can be seen at the BIMS homepage (address below).

Further information
Dr. Vito LEO, Sentier de BOMAL 8, 1315 INCOURT – BELGIUM, vito@bims-seminars.com, TEL.: +32 478 449709. FAX : +32 2 6125066.
http://www.bims-seminars.com.

Previous and future seminars
The seminar has now been presented to more than 1000 participants throughout Europe, including private sessions at Nokia in Finland and Denmark, Ericsson Sweden, Bang & Olufsen and Novo Nordisk in Denmark, Plastic Omnium, Adidas Salomon Sports, Valeo Lighting Systems and Hager Electro in France.

The speakers education and professional experience
Vito LEO is a physicist by training, and has been working for more than 20 years in the field of Polymer Processing. He is particularly active in the field of Injection Molding of Thermoplastics and the use of Finite Element Numerical Simulation of this process.

He works for the largest chemical company in Belgium and is currently involved in a number of research projects in the field of Rheology and Injection Molding. He is also in charge of the Flow Analysis group that uses available commercial software to support injection-molding customers.

His well known expertise has recently gained him a Professor position at Université Libre de Bruxelles, where he is currently teaching an introductory course in Polymer Processing to students of the Engineering Faculty.

The speakers word
As a professional in the Plastic Industry for many years now, I have met a very large number of people involved in this field: part designers, mold makers, molders, technicians on the shop floor, or academic people involved in fundamental research. I have always had the impression that everyone has a limited view of the problems, a good understanding in his particular field, but usually little knowledge of the process as a whole. Even worse, people usually do not understand each other because their job and training background are so different. Very few part designers or project managers know about the really peculiar behavior of molten polymers in a molding process. And no University Professor or Flow Analysis developer seems to know how a molding machine REALLY works or how a mold is made.

During all my professional life I have tried to bridge the gap between those different approaches, being involved in academic research, attending conferences or training sessions, publishing papers, using software, but also spending a lot of time on the shop floor, running the machine myself, and working days and sometime entire weeks in molding shops throughout the world optimizing the process.

Flow Analysis Codes (Moldflow®, Moldex® and the likes) are now established and respected tools, readily available on PC and with excellent user interface and very good modeling capabilities. But optimum use and proper interpretation of results still requires very skilled and experienced specialists. The users I come across are often young computer minded engineers, with limited knowledge of plastics and processing technology.

I also noticed that the recent boom in the Mobile Communications Business is generating extremely fast growth in the leading companies, where very young professionals are now in charge of world-wide projects, involving complex plastic parts, special materials, and very demanding dimensional and mechanical requirements. These engineers would certainly benefit from an appropriate training in Injection Molding and Polymer Physics.

Now that I feel that I have a good understanding of the molding process and the underlying physics, I want to try to share my knowledge with people in the industry.

The challenge I throw at myself is the following: I want to go deeply into the physics of the various thermoplastics processing behavior, thoroughly explain the mechanisms involved in this complex process from filling to final warpage, and yet present this seminar material with simple words and concepts, and minimum mathematics, so that the whole interested community, with or without high level university training, will benefit from these training sessions.

Why attend the course/training seminar?

Major arguments for attending the course are that

• The course will be highly interactive
• Attendance is limited, allowing for questions, group discussions and analysis of attendant problems
• Parts drawings are welcome for open discussion when possible
• You will get a thoroughly teaching in aspects of the polymer injection molding process, in only two days
• You extend your professional network
• The teacher of the course, Dr. Vito LEO has been working nearly 25 years in Polymer Processing and has a well known expertise and this course offers a unike possibility to be updated, guided by Vito LEO.

TIME
8^th March 2012, 10:00 to18:00 and 9^th March, 08.30 to 16.30.

VENUE
Comwell Roskilde, Vestre Kirkevej 12, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark, tel. +45 4632 3131, www.comwell.com.

REGISTRATION FEE
DKK 9.800 + 25% VAT.
Reduced fee if registering before 16th January 2012: DKK 9.400 + 25% VAT.
Members of ATV-SEMAPP gets a deduction of DKK 500.
Includes sessions during the two days, educational materials, luncheons, coffee breaks and dinner first evening. Excl. hotel booking.

REGISTRATION
Click to fill in REGISTRATION FORM or send an e-mail to: semapp@atv-semapp.dk,
or phone to Anette Kaltoft, at +45 4525 4717 (09:00-12:30) or to Erling D. Mortensen, phone +45 4525 4630. If possible, please register before 16th of January 2012 (reduced fee if registering before 16th of January).
Min. 12, max. 25 participant registrations.
Update 2nd of February:
The course is fully booked.
New registrations will be put on a waiting list, and will be informed if a possibility to attend will arise. If we see sufficient interest we possibly will set-up a second session rapidly.

CANCELLATION
Cancellations received 30 days or more before the seminar are fully refunded.
For cancellations received less than 30 days but more than 14 days before the seminar, 70 % of the fee payment will be refunded. No refund for cancellations received later than the 28th of February 2012. Substitutions are accepted at any time.

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