Milacron Holdings has seen increased demand for its industry-leading Low Pressure Injection Moulding (LPIM) Structural Foam machines following NPE 2018 in Orlando, FL.
The display showed a replica platen of the Cincinnati 6,750ton machine sold to 20/20 Custom Moulded Plastics of Holiday City, OH.
At NPE 2018 20/20 entered into an agreement with Milacron to refurbish and upgrade two of its existing 400 ton LPIM machines to 500 ton LPIM machines and one of their 500 ton LPIM machines to 750 ton LPIM machines.
Milacron is also rebuilding and upgrading five of its 750 ton LPIM machines.
The machines will undergo a complete remanufacture and rebuild process at Milacron’s Batavia, OH manufacturing plant and be returned like new machines.
Ideal for injection moulding large, lightweight, durable structural plastic parts, the Milacron LPIM Structural Foam Technology creates a cellular foamed core surrounded by integral skins, forming a total integral and rigid structure.
In this process, a foaming agent N2 is mixed with the polymer melt and short-shot through a modular multiple nozzle system into a mould or multiple moulds in a volume less than is required to fill a solid part.
The injection pressure and expanding gas/polymer cellular mixture act to fill the mould. The mould cavity pressures are 10 – 20 times lower than conventional injection moulding which permits the use of lower cost aluminium moulds with no hot runner.
The multi-nozzle machine design allows for multiple moulds to be run simultaneously allowing for higher productivity.
Milacron is also seeing other new products being developed that are conversions from concrete, metal and wood in the building and infrastructure market as well.