pps proceeding - Abstract Preview
pps proceeding
Symposium: S05 - Novel processing technologies
Poster Presentation
 
 

The study of EVA foaming by using different thermal conductivity molds

Lai Wen-You (1)*, Liu Wen-Jay (1), Cheng Wei-Sheng (1)

(1) Plastics Industry Development Center - Taichung - Taiwan

In this study, the aluminum/epoxy composites for rapid tool were used in the temperature of 200±10℃ and pressure of 100±5 Kg/cm2, and then the EVA foaming tests with different thermal conductivities of rapid tool were studied. The aluminum/epoxy composites with different aluminum concentrations from 0 to 40 wt% were subjected to uniaxial tensile, hardness, thermal conductivity and foaming tests. The experimental results indicate that the tensile strength and modulus are increased from 28.2 and 1746.3 MPa to 43.7 and 3197.3 MPa for aluminum powder of 40 wt%, respectively. In hardness tests, the shore D of hardness increases with increasing filler of aluminum powder, whereas shore D of hardness is slightly increased (aluminum powder of 10 wt%) but remains practically constant. This means that overdose fillers cannot increase the hardness of composites. The thermal conductivity enhances from 0.2439 to 0.5895 W/mK for 40 wt% of aluminum powder which can effectively improve the heating and cooling rate of rapid tool. The bilinear temperature-time curves were recorded in EVA foaming test. One is the heating curve of EVA with different thermal conductivity of rapid tool; the other is the heating curve of initial foaming reaction in EVA. These experimental results indicate that the initial foaming time by using 40 wt% aluminum/epoxy composites is faster than without aluminum powders. This means a 3-fold decreasing of time. Likewise, it not only shortens production cycle but also decreases the cost of manufacturing process.