Increasing the wear resistance of molds for injection of glass fiber reinforced plastics

• Type: Article in International Scientific Journal
• Date: 2011

Authors

Silva, FJG (Author) Other; Martinho, RP (Author) Other; Alexandre, RJD (Author) Other; Baptista, APM (Author) FEUP

Journal

Title: Wear

Vol. 271

Pages: 2494-2499

ISSN: 0043-1648

Publisher: Elsevier

Indexing

ISI Web of Knowledge - 3 Citations

Scopus - 6 Citations

Scientific classification

FOS: Engineering and technology > Mechanical engineering

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-002-PJW

DOI: 10.1016/j.wear.2011.01.074

Abstract (EN): Abrasion by glass fibers during injection molding of fiber reinforced plastics raises new challenges to the wear performance of the molds. In the last few decades, a large number of PVD and CVD coatings have been developed with the aim of minimizing abrasion problems. In this work, two different coatings were tested in order to increase the wear resistance of the surface of a mold used for glass fiber reinforced plastics: TiAlSiN and CrN/CrCN/DLC. TiAlSiN was deposited as a graded monolayer coating while CrN/CrCN/DLC was a nanostructured coating consisting of three distinct layers. Both coatings were produced by PVD unbalanced magnetron sputtering and were characterized using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) provided with energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS), atomic force microscopy (AFM), micro hardness (MH) and scratch test analysis. Coating morphology, thickness, roughness, chemical composition and structure, hardness and adhesion to the substrate were investigated. Wear resistance was characterized through industrial tests with coated samples and an uncoated reference sample inserted in a feed channel of a plastic injection mold working with 30 wt.% glass fiber reinforced polypropylene. Results after 45,000 injection cycles indicate that the wear resistance of the mold was increased by a factor of 25 and 58, by the TiAlSiN and CrN/CrCN/DLC coatings, respectively, over the uncoated mold steel. (C) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific

No. of pages: 6