Introducing myself

[lockwood]

Hi, I am just getting into injection molding as a hobby. I thought it would be right to introduce myself to the community here. I am about as green as it gets when
it comes to molding anything. I highly enjoy RC planes and helicopters, which has lead me into many different things along my journey. From electronics to composite lay-ups to ham-radio/telemetry and now injection molding. Eventually I will get to 3D printing and CNC. My goal (or vision) is to build my own injection molder with pneumatic cylinders, heater bands etc. maybe a microcontroller to semi-automate it in the future. I have not done much searching around here yet so I'll save the questions.

Lockwood

[Suhas]

Welcome Lockwood to this forum.
Just FYI, almost everyone here are people who are involved with commercial molding. Please do not feel left out if your questions do not get answered. Somebody eventually will.
Thanks,
Suhas

[lockwood]

Thanks Suhas, I figured as much after surfing through the posts here. I would much rather take advise from here knowing that its coming from experienced craftsmen. I am going to mold
RC propeller as im learning how to fly acro and am breaking alot of props. As far as the material used, Its going to be trial and error. It will be a compromise between rigidity and brittleness. My template piece is 10"/254mm(length) by 1.09"/28mm(width) at its widest and .25"/6.5mm (height) current material weighs 11g. I am going to out-source the molds ( i need a CW rotating and a CCW rotating propeller). I am planning on using a pnumatic cylinder for shot injection, a pnumatic cylinder for mold halve movement. A heated cavity for the material. I am not sure which direction I should work from,I.E. build based off of mold criteria or build and design mold based off of injector structure. Also since this is not a typical screw injector setup I can't find much information on at least minimum pressures to turn atleast a novice part. I realize much of this may be vauge and can't be answered so please be nice guys. What questions should I be asking myself or info I could give to keep taking solid baby steps.

Thanks
Lockwood

[Suhas]

Hi Lockwood,
I don't want to tell you what to do but I think if you first take care of the prop breaking issue, get the right material, mold, and have a molder mold them - then you can see what you will really need on the machine you are building. You may need extra timers, etc, etc, and so you can then design accordingly. Even barrel heater bands wold be different if you end up with a high temp melting material.
Just some thoughts.
Suhas

[techkits]

Hi Lockwood,

Have you seen this website? - http://www.easyplasticmolding.com

They have hobby level machines and small quantities of resins that may be useful for molding RC propellers.

DW

[07gtimyfast]

Hey Lockwood, I'm doing something similar I just tried to post my starting build thread here but I think I might have done something wrong or it has to get approved first.

I'm using an old log splitter I had, and converting it to electric over hydraulic to obtain about 15 tons clamping force and 5000 lbf max injection pressure, once it is up and running I will be automating it using Arduino, in fact I already have the components and the code written now I just have to complete the machine :) I would love to share notes, I found that using pneumatic cylinders would not get me close to the specified injection pressures from material suppliers. As a hobby machine however it seems a few people have done it with good results.

-07