Applying flow simulations in the development process of injection moulded thermoplastic parts

The main challenge of this contribution pertains to the local prediction of mechanical properties over the entire domain of an injection moulded unreinforced thermoplastic component as a function of process settings by means of flow simulations. Current state-of-the-art prediction capabilities are limited and thus hamper the advantage of simulations in the product development process. In the proposed approach, a dedicated computer application allows importing computer aided flow study results from the Autodesk Moldflow Insight package and locally, i.e. per element of the meshed model, characterising the thermo-mechanical environment (TME). Cooling and thermo-stress indices (at the end of filling, packing, and cooling phases), are used to characterise the local thermal and mechanical environment during the injection moulding process. The prediction of the Young's modulus through the TME assessment for certain regions of the thermoplastic automotive component (door panel) was accomplished and compared to experimental results, having shown good agreement, thus validating the proposed approach.