mould & die
GTMA’s CEO Julia Moore shares with MWP readers news from the
frontline of R&D, with information on the progress of Emold, a
project which aims to revolutionise mouldmaking.
World first in mould
development
Background
to Emold -
Facts and
Figures
THE Emold project
started in October 2006
and is due for
completion by the end
of September 2009 with
a budget of 3.7 million
and EU funding of ¤2.2
million.
The involvement of
SMEs is seen as
particularly important to
ensure the project
addresses ‘real-life’
issues in a practical way.
The European plastics
processing industry
includes 39,000
companies, 85% of them
SMEs, with an annual
turnover of ¤140 billion.
Europe ranks second,
behind the USA, in
worldwide plastics
production, and
employs more than one
million workers, iE 4.5%
of the labour force.
THE Emold project is investigating the practical
applications of a radical new concept in plastic injection
mouldmaking, through the use of what are believed to
be the world’s first networked and intelligent mould
tools. It is the GTMA’s belief that research is critical to
the future survival of our industry. Our active
involvement in this and other EU-funded R&D
projects, well before the current financial crisis,
underlines the point; it is essential that we continue to
develop our processes and capabilities even during the
economic downturn if we are to benefit from the
opportunities that will inevitably occur when the
economic climate changes.
In addition, participation in such projects has the
benefit of allowing SME suppliers to come into direct
contact, as equals, with major OEMs. Household names
such as Bespak, Motorola, JCB, and Muller are actively
involved with GTMA members in a range of R&D
projects and, whereas it would be difficult for a single
SME to participate in such projects, involvement
through a trade association offers the benefits of
cutting edge research with infrastructure support. We
believe that the main technological challenges to the
plastic injection moulding sector today are to maintain
technological leadership for high tech plastic products
and to overcome the economic disadvantage associated
with higher European costs of both labour and tooling;
the Emold project addresses both these issues.
The Emold project involves 15 partners from eight
countries under the umbrella of a three year European
collective research programme. It might seem rather
ambitious, at this particular juncture, to attempt to
redefine the plastic injection moulding process.
However, the radical nature of the Emold approach
demands that the whole plastic injection moulding
process needs to be rethought. This is because Emold
envisages a system whereby moulds cease to be passive
elements in the injection moulding process, and
become instead, active, knowledge-bearing elements
which can be networked together, both locally and
remotely.
The effect of this would be, firstly, to improve the
efficiency of the whole process, from mouldmaking to
60 MWP january 2009
production, as all process parameters could be
monitored and adjusted in real time, enabling much
finer tuning and therefore a more optimised
production process. Secondly, these ‘intelligent’ moulds,
whose embedded knowledge includes the expertise of
their technicians and engineers, would be able to
exploit that knowledge more efficiently, providing a
positive feed-back loop, continuously improving the
‘intelligence’ of the moulds. Thirdly, as the moulds
would be part of a network, they could send essential
information to all other participants in the supply
chain, thus speeding up communications and enabling
decisions to be made and changes to be instigated more
quickly and more efficiently.
The Emold concept
The mould is the process component closest to the
moulded part - because the actual moulding occurs
within the mould itself. This fact is at the heart of the
Emold project, and it means that the measurements and
controls applied to the mould provide the clearest and
most accurate record of what is actually happening in
the moulding process. It is logical therefore that the
mould should participate in the process control directly,
rather than leaving this role to the injection moulding
machine.To this end, Emold is working on three key
developments: the mechatronics embedded in the
mould, the software to enable the networking of
moulds, and finally the knowledge-based system to
create the ‘intelligence’ in the moulds. Naturally, it is
also part of the project’s brief to ensure that the final
Emold device will be not only compact, but also
sufficiently robust to withstand the tough conditions of
a moulding plant.
The key mechatronic element in the Emold system is
an embedded microPC attached to the mould, and
which remains an integral part of the mould
throughout its productive life. The selection of the
hardware and the programming of the software needed
for the data acquisition and connectivity were
developed by Fatronik, and the first prototype was
tested at ASCAMM. Continuing the test
programme, three additional moulds are being
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