In the production of automotive injection molding parts, the addition of trace amount of powder materials, plays a key role in product consistency and process stability, especially in the production of multiple varieties, small batches, and fast switching orders, traditional way of manual feeding is not only inefficient and error-prone, also easily affects on-site safety and work convenience.
This case introduction is the Client in automotive injection molding industry; client’s production involves more than 300 kinds of formula. A single formula requires weighing up to 10 different powder materials, with a minimum feed amount of 100 grams. The powder properties vary greatly, and some are sticky. Client previous processing way is main material is added uniformly through a mixer set on the second-floor platform, the required trace amounts of powder manual blending and feeding frequently from ground floor or upper platforms. By manual feeding not only inefficient and labor-intensive but also affects the accuracy and stability of feeding.
In view of client’s current production situation, Mconvey provided a customized dosing and feeding system for trace amount of powder material for customers. This system integrates multiple sets of gravimetric doser, with a plug valve feeding device and a buffer hopper. System has the advantages of high precision, continuous feeding, modular and flexible expansion, etc., which solves the on-site problems for client.
Composition
Loss-in-weight doser for pigment
The system consists of 8 pigment gravimetric dosers, each of which can be independently dosed and controlled. The weighing module monitors the amount of addition in real time to ensure accurate proportioning. The equipment structure is easy to clean, supports fast color switch, and reduces residue and cross contamination. Among them, there are 4 dosers for customers to handle slightly sticky powder materials. In order to prevent adhesion and poor feeding, Teflon coating is specially used, which effectively improves the fluidity of feeding and the stability of equipment operation.
Plug valve refill
It can automatically start refilling when the weight of the feeder drops to the set lower limit, and keep the dosing continuous and uninterrupted during the refilling process to avoid “lack of powder” affecting the ratio.
Buffer hopper
As a transfer buffer, it avoids the impact of injection molding machine material fluctuations on the feeding system, realizes continuous feeding and smooth transition, and improves the overall operation stability of the system.
Advantages
Accurate feeding of trace amount material
The amount of powder is accurate to grams, with an error of less than ±0.5%, ensuring color consistency and avoiding rework caused by color difference problems.
Continuous “loss-in-weight” dosing of each component
Each component has its own independent weighing device and adopts the “loss-in-weight” dosing mode, which can be dosed at the same time, with high dosing efficiency and high accuracy.
Multi-component combination and flexible expansion
Freely expand 2~8 groups of loss-in-weight feeders according to actual formula requirements, with a high degree of system integration and a compact layout that does not take up space.
Convenient cleaning and color change
The loss-in-weight feeder is easy to disassemble and wash, reduce color change residues, shorten process switching time, and improve production flexibility.
Intelligent management
With a PLC control system, it can display each group of data in real time and record the ratio history. Mobile APP service can be configured to monitor key system data anytime, anywhere.
This system is not only suitable for auto parts injection molding, but also for daily chemical packaging, 3Celectronics, home appliance plastic parts, toys, building materials and medical consumables industries. It is especially suitable for precision injection molding production lines with multiple formulas, trace additions, and high-frequency color changes.
