Study on numerical simulation and experiment of lightguide plate in injection molding

This paper presents the application of injection molding of wedge-shaped plates for lightguiding application. This paper discusses the influence of processing parameters on injection molding. The filling stages of lightguide plate for mold flow simulation (3D, midplane) are analyzed. The numerical simulation of mold filling process is based on the concept of control volume finite element method. The hot plastic melt touches the cold wall that forms the solid layer, a solid-liquid interface moves and a two-phase flow exists. The enthalpy model is used to predict this interface in the two-phase flow problem. The experiments carry out short-shots process to compare with numerical simulation. The experiments also indicate the pressure distribution at thin and thick ends of lightguide plate using pressure transducers. The results show that the results of 3D filling situation is close to those from experiments. The melt front progress of 3D numerical simulation is predicted more accurately than midplane numerical simulation.