Computer analysis and experimental studies of mold flow in SMC molding

An experimental and numerical analysis of SMC compression molding under non-isothermal and isothermal conditions was conducted in this study. The main purpose of the present work is to study the local flow mechanism without considering the curing reaction. The experimental study has been performed on an instrumented flat plate mold and a slotted mold (used to manufacture flat plates with reinforcement substructure) at various processing conditions using both SMC and resin without fibers. Comparisons between the experimental results from the flat plane mold and those from the mold with the reinforcing rib are presented. A numerical analysis was conducted using ALPID, which is a finite element code based on the viscoplastic flow formulation. Detailed information about the cross-sectional view of flow front, stress distribution, velocity profile, pressure profile, and temperature distribution can be obtained. The predicted computational results compare well with the experimental data.