Abstract:

Based on the CAE technology for powder injection molding and the fractional factorial design method, the injection process was numerically simulated by using the Moldflow software to forecast the effects of the process parameters and their pairwise interactions on the blank quality. According to the simulated results, the relationships among the temperature, the pressure, the filling speed and the time were investigated using a FC-80 injection mol- ding machine, and an optimal combination of process parameters was thus determined. The results indicate that （1） there exist strong pairwise interactions among the process parameters, which affect the product more greatly than a single factor; （2） the optimal combination of process parameters obtained by experiments accord well with the simulated one; and （3） the CAE technology in combination with experiments helps to optimize the process parameters and improve the product quality without repeated analyses.

Key words: powder injection molding, numerical simulation, process optimization, orthogonal experiment, pair- wise interaction