Y. C.

Lam
e-mail: myclam@ntu.edu.sg

X. Chen K. C. Tam
Singapore-MIT Alliance Program, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639798, Singapore

Simulation of Particle Migration of Powder-Resin System in Injection Molding

Powder injection molding is an important processing method for producing precision metallic or ceramic parts. Experience, intuition and trial-and-error have been the practice for the design and process optimization of such molding operations. However, this practice is becoming increasingly inefcient and impractical for the molding of larger, more complicated and more costly parts. In this investigation, a numerical method for simulating the mold-lling phase of powder injection molding was developed. The ow was modelled using the Hele-Shaw approach coupled with particle diffusion transport equation for the calculation of powder concentration distribution. The viscosity of the feedstock was evaluated using a power-law type rheological model to account for the viscosity dependency on shear rate and powder concentration. A numerical example is presented and discussed to demonstrate the capabilities and limitations of the simulation algorithm, which has the potential as an analytical tool for the mold designer. The variation of powder density distribution can be predicted, which is ignored by the existing simulation packages. Preliminary simulation indicated that powder concentration variation could be signicant. Non-isothermal analysis indicated that most of the key parameters for lling process would change due to a change in powder concentration distribution. DOI: 10.1115/1.1580850

S. C. M. Yu
School of Mechanical & Production Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639798, Singapore

Introduction

Powder injection molding PIM is a relatively new process for producing metallic or ceramic net shape parts. The main steps of the powder injection molding process are: 1 Mixing a metallic or ceramic powder with a polymer or organic binder to form granular feedstock with the desired fraction of powder; 2 Loading the granular feedstock into a heated barrel and with the shearing action of a high torque screw, the granular feedstock reaches a semimolten state; 3 The semi-molten feed is injected into a cooled mold cavity to form the net shape green part; 4 The nal part is formed by debinding and sintering of the green part 1 . The injection molding step is important. Indeed, if the molded part is signicantly heterogeneous, then distortions and defects could appear in the nal products. For a successful powder injection molding, an important factor is moldability. The high quality part depends not only on the viscosity of the feedstock but also the injection molding process. Many researchers have focused on the appropriate volume fraction of powder and binder system for successful powder injection molding 2,3 . However, the ow of the powder-binder mixture in PIM process is difcult to predict. Feedstock, usually with 40% 60% powder, is a two-phase material that can be viewed as a concentrated suspension. The density distribution of the powder changes during molding and the molding process exhibits strong nonlinearity that is dependent on the powder density. In the existing numerical algorithms for simulating practical powder injection molding process, the inner structural changes i.e., powder density distribution in the material during injection molding are generally ignored. The bulk properties of the concentrated suspension powder/resin mixture are represented by material constants assuming that the mixture is homogeneous. This continuum approach 4 8 is sufcient only for describing the macroscopic behavior by using an effective, or bulk, viscosity of the mixture. This can provide general useful information on the overall ow behavior of the feedstock and for predicting the occurrence of short shots. The phenomena of yield
Contributed by the Manufacturing Engineering Division for publication in the JOURNAL OF MANUFACTURING SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING. Manuscript received March 2001; revised October 2002. Associate Editor: R. Smelser.

stress and slip had been included also for the description of the PIM lling process 4 . However, this continuum approach neglects the interaction between particle and binder system and cannot predict the changes of powder density distribution as a function of time and location during the lling phase. Granular media mechanics 9 is an alternative approach that can be used to predict the motion of individual particles. In granular media mechanics, the kinematic change of powder density is directly taken into account together with explicit evaluation of particle-binder interaction and powder characteristics, such as particle size and distribution. However, such an approach limits the number of particles that can be considered before the computational effort becomes excessive. Thus, its potential for simulating industrial process is limited. Various investigators had proposed shear-induced particle migration theory to explain a number of ow phenomena for concentrated suspensions including particle accumulation and a blunted velocity prole in simple ow systems. Leighton and Acrivos 10,11 suggested phenomenological models for particle migration in imhomongenous shear ow typically due to migration and irreversible interactions. Following the earlier studies of Jenkins and McTigue 12 , Nott and Brady 13 proposed a suspension balance model for concentrated suspension, in which the concept of hydrodynamic temperature was used as a measure of the intensity of the velocity uctuations of the particles. Using Stokesian dynamics, Nott and Brady 13 had recently carried out dynamic simulations of pressure-driven ow for a suspension in a two-dimensional channel with respect to a monolayer of identical spherical non-Brownian particles. Their simulations conrmed the Leighton and Acrivos 10 shear induced migration theory and showed the gradual accumulation of particles toward the center of the channel, leading to a concentration maximum near the centerline, and a blunting of velocity proles. Philipes et al. 14 adapted the scaling arguments of Leighton & Acrivos 10,11 , together with an empirical relationship between the suspension viscosity and particle concentration, to predict particle migration for imhomogeneous shear ows. There are many accumulated experimental evidences that show the difference in ow eld between concentrated suspensions and an equivalent homogeneous Transactions of the ASME

538 Vol. 125, AUGUST 2003

Copyright 2003 by ASME

ignored through Hele-Shaw approximation and yet good results are obtained is that the effect due to the ow eld is cumulative. Fountain ow at any location only occurs for a very short duration compared to the ow at the wake of the ow front, which conforms to Hele-Shaw approximation. 2.1 Flow Governing Equation. The concentrated suspension mixture of particle/binder of PIM is assumed to be a generalized Newtonian uid. In injection molding the inertial terms in the momentum conservation equation are negligible. The ow can be assumed to be quasi-steady ow and the lubrication approximation can be used for modelling the global ow behavior in the mold cavity. The Hele-Shaw model 18 for thin part can be employed. The resultant sets of equation can be written as: bu x P x P y z z b v y u z
v z

Fig. 1 Schematic of illustrating the location of the melt inside the cavity

liquid. As reported by Karnis et al. 15 , the velocity prole of a owing suspension in a circular channel was blunt, compared to the typical parabolic prole. Averbakh et al. 16 and Koh et al. 17 described an experimental method of measuring velocities in slow viscous ows of highly concentrated suspensions with Laser Doppler Anemometry technique. Their measurements conrmed that velocity proles in a concentrated suspension were blunt due to the accumulation of particles from high shear area migrated to low shear area and it was different from those for a Newtonian uid. In this investigation, a new numerical approach which has the potential of general applicability, but targeting the simulation of practical powder injection molding process at this instance, is proposed. This approach incorporates the advantages of the continuum and particulate approaches and can be applied to complex industrial processes. The present analytical and numerical development can provide an insight into the mold lling process so as to predict the concentration distribution of the powder, a major characteristic of powder injection molding. The proposed model is based on the generalized Hele-Shaw ow model 18 for thin cavities, coupled with a diffusion model which describes the interaction between powder and binder. Flow behavior of the powder/binder mixture is approximated by non-Newtonian viscosity model under nonisothermal conditions. Simulation results are presented for the prediction of the effects of shear-induced particle migration during powder injection molding. In essence, the pressure, temperature and concentration of the powder in the mixture can be computed, which are used to predict the shape and location of the moving ow front as a function of time. Subsequently, the changes in powder density distribution, the velocity distribution, shear rate and weld line formation can be extracted from these results. These results of pressure, temperature of the mixture and concentration of the powder, are processing parameters that affect the properties and shape of the green part.

(1) (2) (3)

where continuity equation is expressed in terms of gapwise averaged velocity components and , and u and v are velocity u v components in the x and y directions respectively, b is the half thickness, is the apparent shear viscosity and P is the cavity pressure. Following Krieger 19 , the viscosity of concentrated suspension mixture of powder/binder is represented by the inelastic model ( ,T, ), where u z
2

(4)

and T is the temperature. The temperature eld is described by the energy equation, simplied further by employing the small thickness approximation as follow, Cv T t u T x
v

T y

T z2

u z

v z

(5)

where is the feedstock effective density, C v the specic heat, and K the thermal conductivity. When the no slip boundary condition is employed at the wall and with a given viscosity, Eqs. 1 and 2 are easily integrated. The result is, for PIM application where viscosity is symmetric in z, u where With
x b z x z

dz ,

b z y z

dz

(6)

Theoretical Basis

P/ x,

We consider the concentrated suspension mixture of powder and binder system occupying a three-dimensional region (t) at any time t lling the cavity under the action of high pressure and temperature, as shown in Fig. 1. For clarity of explanation, we have restricted the ow to the plane of the gure. The formation of the solid skin layer is neglected in this work. In Cartesian coordinates the boundary is dened by the outer contour C 0 in the x, y plane; the gap thickness 2b in the z-direction is much smaller than the length scale dening C 0 . The uid enters the cavity across the entry contour C e , and as time t marches, occupies a region extending to the moving front C m (t). There may be also impermeable contours C i within C 0 . Our objective is to determine the ow eld and the powder distribution within these boundaries occupied by the feedstock. It must be pointed out that an important aspect common to all injection molding processes, which has been neglected in the present formulation, is fountain ow of the ow front. This assumption of ignoring fountain ow was employed in established plastic injection molding software such as Moldow and good results can be achieved. The reason why fountain ow can be Journal of Manufacturing Science and Engineering

P/ y; b half of thickness of the part.

b

S
b

z2

dz

(7)

Integrating equation 1 across the thickness, the following equation can be obtained: x S P x y S P y 0 (8)

It should be noted that the adoption of this symmetrical assumption for this preliminary investigation is for clarity in explanation. This assumption can be easily relaxed. 2.2 Migration of Particles. When a suspension powder/ binder mixture is subjected to imhomgeneous shear ow in the cavity, diffusion of particles takes place. The particle Peclet number P e a 2 /D, dened in terms of local shear rate , particle radius a and diffusivity D, is large for PIM, This implies that Brownian force can be neglected. Phillips et al. 14 proposed a AUGUST 2003, Vol. 125 539

Table 1 Values of characteristic parameters of PIM Characteristic parameters Cavity thickness b Cavity length L Velocity of feedstock (V) Viscosity of feedstock ( 0 ) Thermal conductivity of feedstock k Density of feedstock Initial concentration ( 0 ) Particle diameter (a 0 ) Characteristic values b 10 3 m L b/ m where b/L 1 V 10 1 m/s 4 0 10 Pas k 1 100 W/mK 5 103 kg/m3 1 0 5 10 a 0 10 5 m

In the simplied diffusion Eq. 11 , the diffusion coefcients, D 1 and D 2 are functions of the particle size and density, shear rate, and viscosity: D1 Dc D D2 Dc
2

a2
2 2

a2

(12a) (12b)

phenomenological model for the shear-induced diffusion phenomenon for a neutrally buoyant uniform particle size, based on the ideas suggested earlier by Leighton and Acrivos 10,11 . They describe two mechanisms. The rst mechanism concerns the nonuniform frequency of particle interactions in a shear eld. Particles tend to move from region of high frequency to region of low frequency. The second mechanism comes from the nonuniform viscosity eld in which the interaction between two adjacent particles is asymmetrical. As a results of such an interaction a particle moving towards the low effective viscosity region will move a larger distance than the other particle. Based on these two mechanisms, Phillips et al. 14 presented a unsteady state diffusion equation which can model particle migration in imhomongeneous shear ow. D Dt D ca 2
2

where and a are the shear rate and the particle radius respectively. For polydisperse concentrated suspension with varying particle size, a mean particle size could be employed in Eqs. 12a and 12b . Shear-induced diffusion is assumed to be independent of interparticle interactions, which include frictional and colloidal forces. These effects are incorporated in the constants D c and D of the above equation, which could be determined by conducting the appropriate experiments 11,14,20 . If a nonhomogeneous shear ow initiated in powder-resin system with uniform particle concentration, the second term of the right hand side of Eq. 11 produces a ux, which in turn causes a concentration gradient and hence induces a second ux by the rst term. Equation 11 must be supplemented with appropriate condition at the boundary, which is simply that the particle could not migrate through the physical boundary. 2.3 Material Models. In this investigation, the viscosity of the bulk material is taken to be a function of the neat binder viscosity and the volume fraction of the powder. We have adopted the following Krieger rheological model 19 .
m b

D a2

1 d d (9)

1
c

(13)

where D/Dt / t V is the material time derivative. is the three-dimensional Laplace operator in the x, y, and z directions, is particle concentration by volume, a is the characteristic particle radius, is the local shear rate, D c and D are the empirically determined diffusion coefcients. Equation 9 is second order and nonlinear in particle fraction volume (x,y,z,t), where x, y, z are the coordinates in a Cartesian coordinate system. For simple system, such as Coutte ow 11 , this equation can be solved together with the ow governing equation for a Newtonian uid with concentrationdependent viscosity to yield both time-dependent and steady-state concentration and velocity proles. However, the solution of Eq. 9 is difcult and time-consuming for PIM without simplication as the powder-resin mixture is a non-Newtonian uid with timedependent ow eld and transient concentration and velocity proles. The signicance of the various term in Eq. 9 could be obtained by examining the values of the parameters. Estimates for the values of the characteristic parameters of PIM are contained in Table 1. We use the following scales: x Lx * b/ t x *, y Lx * b/ y *, (10)

and c are the powder where b is the viscosity of binder. concentration and the critical powder loading respectively. This rheological model describes the effect of the volume fraction of the powder on the ow behavior of powder/binder mixture. In this preliminary investigation, monodisperse particle size uniform particle size was used. For polydisperse concentrated suspension with varying particle size, empirical correlation method 21 can be employed to determine the constants of the Krieger rheological model. As the powder distribution is calculated, the feedstock effective density and specic heat C v can be determined respectively using the linear rule of mixture as follows:
1 2

(14) (15)

C v C v1

C v2 1

where 1 and 2 are the densities of the binder system and powder particle respectively. C v 1 and C v 2 are the specic heats of the binder system and powder particle respectively. To estimate the thermal conductivity K, Jeffreys equation is adopted, which should give a better approximation than the linear rule of mixture. The Jeffreys equation can be represented as 6 : K 1 3
2

3 3 4

9 3 16 2

2 3

3 4 64

K m (16)

z bz * , u w

L/V t *
v

b/ V t * , L/t v * V v * ,
0

L/t u * Vu * , b/t w * Vw * ,

*,

where K f /K m and ( 1)/( 2), K, K f , and K m are the thermal conductivity of feedstock, particles and binder matrix respectively. is the particle volume fraction. 2.4 Numerical Procedures. It should be pointed out that the Krieger rheological model, Eq. 13 , diffusion Eq. 11 and ow governing Eqs. 1 3 , are employed for this preliminary investigation. We believe that with these simple relationships, they are sufcient to capture the effect of powder migration during the lling stage in PIM. A numerical scheme of nite element/nite difference method has been implemented for solving the pressure, temperature and powder distribution elds. In the present method, a single nite element mesh representing the mid-surface of the Transactions of the ASME

When these scalings and values are introduced into diffusion Eq. 9 , the transient term, convection term and particle migration term normal to the shear face z direction are at least one order of magnitude larger than the other terms in Eq. 9 . Thus, we obtain the simplied diffusion equation as follow: u
v

D1

D2

(11)

540 Vol. 125, AUGUST 2003

Fig. 2 Schematic of control volume and nite difference grid used for pressure, temperature, and particle concentration computations respectively

cavity, is used to solve for moving ow front as reported by Hieber and Shen 18 . Thin shell triangular elements are used to describe a three-dimensional thin part. The triangular elements are further divided into three sub-volumes, which are considered to be a net work of control volume, as shown in Fig. 2. The nodal control-volume formulation is derived from the Galerkin approach, as described by Hieber and Wang 18,2223 . The numerical equation for the net ow q ( l ) of element l can be written as:
3

advancement as a function of time. To distinguish the lled nodes from melt front nodes, a ll factor f i j , having a value between 0 and 1, which is associated with each element to indicate the percentage of lling, is dened by: f ij V i j /V i (20)

qil

l k 1

l R ik P N ,

i 1,2 or 3

(17)

(l where S ( l ) and R ik) are the ow conductance and the coefcient of the nodal pressure to the net ow in element l respectively. Mass conservation for the control volume at node N can be written as:
3 l k 1 l R ik P N 0

where V i and V i j denote control volume and lled volume respectively of ith vertex node at the j time step. Numerical calculation of the pressure eld is based on mass conservation in each control volume which can be either empty ( f i j 0), partially lled (0 f i j 1) or completely lled ( f i j 1) with feedstock. In each time step, the pressure eld is calculated to obtain the velocity distribution in the ow domain. It is important to note that for (z) in the newly-lled volume, its initial value may be taken as the average value of its neighbor upper-stream element. The main numerical step employed for ow analysis of powder injection molding can be summarized as: a. The viscosity of molten powder-mixture is calculated using Eq. 13 for each element.
Table 2 Composition of the binder 7 Binder Materials Polypropylene Carrnauba Wax Parafn Stearic Acid Density kg/m3 0.903 0.970 0.900 0.850 Weight Percent of binder 20 10 69 1

S
l

(18)

Nodal Eq. 18 can be solved for the nodal pressure. A nite difference grid, as shown in Fig. 2, is mapped onto each element centroid for solving the unsteady energy and diffusion equations and to capture the through thickness variation of temperature, and through thickness particle migration. The nodal energy and diffusion equation with averaged temperature and particle concentration evaluated at the node of each element in matrix form can be written as: K
N

Mk

(19)

where K N is the global stiffness matrix, M k 1 N is the pending matrix vector such as nodal vector of temperature or powder concentration at time step k 1. F N is the force vector including the convection, viscous heating and the initial temperature or particle concentration terms. Equation 19 can be solved for temperature or powder distribution. A FAN approach 23 of which the rectangular cells are replaced by the control volumes is employed to track the ow front

Table 3 Physical characteristics of the powder 7 Density kg/m3 7.87 Specic heat C p (J/kgK) 328.3 Conductivity Coefcient W/mK 75.8 Critical particle loading
c

Material Iron

0.6

Table 4 Physical and rheological characteristics of the materials 7 Constant n Eq. 21a 0.99 0.20 Constant Ta K Eq. 21b 2138 6660 Constant m 0 (Pasn ) Eq. 21b 2.864 10 5 6.5 10 5 Specic heat C p (J/kgK) 2790 1313 Conductivity coefcient W/mK 0.024 45.5 Constant m Eq. 13 1.82

Material Binder Feedstock

Journal of Manufacturing Science and Engineering

AUGUST 2003, Vol. 125 541

Fig. 3 Mesh of the rectangular plate cavity

b. Global stiffness matrix equation from ow conductance obtained using Eq. 7 . c. At each instant we have a boundary value problem with normal gradients specied along C e , C 0 , C i and C m . The pressure eld Eq. 8 , which is quasi-linear in pressure P if the temperature is known, is solved iteratively as ow conductance S is dependent on , and also the temperature T. T should be deteru v mined from Eq. 5 simultaneously. The convergence of the solution is achieved using a relaxation scheme at each time step by the nite element method. d. Temperature eld Eq. 5 is solved using nite difference method. Its variation at entry and along the wall must be prescribed. An implicit method is used for the conduction term. The viscous dissipation and convection terms are evaluated using the solution from the previous time step. This method allows the calculation of the temperature as a function of time and position of through thickness direction from node to node. e. Concentration variation, which is a transient threedimensional eld, is solved using Eqs. 11 , and 12 at the nodal points of the nite element mesh, with the ow determined from the previous time step by the nite difference procedure in the conservative form for every lling steps. f. Subsequent to the convergence of pressure, temperature and concentration, the melt front is updated by calculating the ux at each frontal control volume. This procedure is carried out until the cavity is completely lled.

lation is shown in Fig. 3 384 elements, 211 nodes . Node G is the gate location. The molten feedstock temperature is 200C, lling time is 2 s ow rate is 20 cm3/s . The mold temperature is 80C. To investigate the effects of powder density on the lling stage, powder concentration distribution and effective viscosity were assumed to be uniform at the gate. Non-isothermal simulations with the assumption of no particle migration and with particle migration were carried out. Without particle migration, uniform particle

Results and Discussions

3.1 Material Data. The material data employed for the numerical examples in this paper are tabulated in Tables 2, 3, and 4 respectively. The viscosity relationship for the binder is approximated using the following power law viscosity model 24 : g T n g T
1

(21a) (21b)

m 0 exp T a /T

where n, m, m 0 , and T a are material constants. The power law index n and the temperature dependent material constant for the binder and feedstock are contained in Table 4. 3.2 Rectangular Plate Cavity. A rectangular plate cavity has been chosen to demonstrate the effects of powder density distribution on ow and heat transfer during the mold lling stage. The dimensions of the rectangular plate are 10 cm by 20 cm with a thickness of 0.2 cm. The nite element mesh used in this simu542 Vol. 125, AUGUST 2003

Fig. 4 a Predicted bulk powder concentration % distribution with D c D 0.66 and s 45% b Predicted bulk powder concentration % distribution with D c D 0.90 and s 45%

Transactions of the ASME

Fig. 5 a Bulk temperature distribution without particle migration at the end of lling t 2 s b Bulk temperature distribution with particle migration at the end of lling t 2 s

density distribution would always be predicted, which is not realistic. With particle migration, a nal inhomogeneous green part would be predicted. 3.3 Effect of Diffusion Constants D c and D . There are no experimental data on the diffusion coefcients for iron powder mixtures. Thus, three sets of diffusion constants D c and D were chosen: 0. and 0. , 0.43 and 0.65 , 0.55 and 0.65 . This is to observe the effect of the diffusion constants on particle migration. In addition, mono-size iron powder particles of 50 m in radius were assumed for each simulation. Non-isothermal simulations were carried out. The nonhomogeneous shear ow eld during molding is existed in the part. As expected, from shear-induced diffusion model, Eq. 11 , powder migrated toward low shear regions from high shear regions resulting in powder accumulation as shown in Fig. 4 a . For D c /D 0.66 (D c 0.43 and D 0.65) and initial concentration s 45%, the maximum bulk powder concentration is approximately 47.1%. The minimum bulk powder concentration is approximately 43.1%. According to Eqs. 12a and 12b , the diffusion coefcients D 1 and D 2 are proportional to the diffusion constants D c and D . Figure 4 b shows the through thickness average bulk distribuJournal of Manufacturing Science and Engineering

tion powder concentration of the part with D c /D 0.90 (D c 0.55 and D 0.65) at the end of lling with the same initial concentration as in Fig. 4 a . The maximum bulk powder concentration is approximately 47.8%. The minimum bulk powder concentration is approximately 42.6%. As expected, with larger D c /D , there was greater particle density variation. 3.4 Effect of Particle Migration on Temperature and Pressure. Particle density has an effect on thermal conductivity, and therefore on temperature distribution. In addition, it has a pronounced effect on the through thickness viscosity distribution, and thus work done through shear heating. Figures 5 a and b respectively show the temperature distribution through thickness average without and with particle migration for the whole domain. It indicates that for the same input volume ow rate, temperature without particle migration was higher than with particle migration. A better appreciation can be obtained by considering the global picture: without particle migration, the reduction in dissipation rate was lower. Thus, the network done had to be higher and this would result in higher overall increase in temperature. Obviously, the temperature distribution depends on the local particle concentration. A specic node is chosen to show the AUGUST 2003, Vol. 125 543

Fig. 7 a Contour plots of particle concentration % at a Section A-A, b Section B-B, c Section C-C; The value of the contour of particle volume concentration % are: 1 52.0; 2 50.2; 3 48.4; 4 46.7; 5 44.9 6 43.1; 7 41.3; 8 39.5; 9 37.8; 10 36.0

Fig. 6 a Temperature prole at node 148 as the cavity was lled Without migration, a 50 m; D c D 0.66, a 50 m b Pressure prole at the gate G as the cavity was lled D c D 0.66, a 50 m; Without migration, a 50 m

3.5 Through Thickness Powder Concentration and Velocity Distribution. To further illustrate the effect of powder migration, 2D contour plots of particle density concentration are taken at three different cross-sections of the part. Figures 7 a , b , and c show the contour plots of cross-sections A-A, B-B, C-C, respectively, their locations are shown in Fig. 3. Note that with symmetry, only a quarter of the cross-sections are shown. It is evident that powder concentration at the midplane increased considerably with a corresponding signicant decrease in powder concentration at the outer surface i.e., along the y-axes, z 0). This was caused by the relatively high shear rate at the outer surface next to the wall and negligible shear rate at the midplane of the part. With an increase in distance in the axial direction, i.e.,

change of physical variables during the lling stage. Figures 6 a and b show the temperature variation at internal node 148 as shown in Fig. 3 and pressure variation at the gate point G respectively as the cavity was being lled. The results were obtained with D c /D 0.66 (D c 0.43 and D 0.65) and s 45%. In addition, the simulation was carried out with the assumption of no particle migration and particle migration under the conditions of non-isothermal ow. Figure 6 a shows that the temperature for the assumption of no particle migration was consistently higher than with particle migration. The reason being that with particle migration, the thermal properties, such as thermal conductivity and specic heat, had changed for the blend. Lower temperature with particle migration would translate into higher viscosity and thus higher resistance to ow. With the same ow rate, higher pressure at the gate would be expected as shown in Fig. 6 b . This means that the driving force, such as pressure gradient, of the feedstock was also affected by the migration of the particles. Different particle volume fraction, distribution and volume ow rate would cause different pressure gradient. This shows clearly that changes in particle concentration and effective viscosity distributions could result in a change of power required to drive the ow. This prediction is consistent with experimental observation of Seifu 25 for viscous ows of concentrated suspensions exhibiting shear-induced particles migration. 544 Vol. 125, AUGUST 2003

Fig. 8 Through thickness velocity proles at end of lling t 2 s at node 148 in Fig. 3 0.45; 0.35; 0.25; 0.0

Transactions of the ASME

Fig. 10 Mesh of the box cavity Fig. 9 Gate pressure evolution for different mesh sizes 146 meshes; 384 meshes; 680 meshes

from section A-A to C-C, particle migration became more pronounced. With a decrease in concentration at the region of the wall, there was an increase in concentration considerably at the stagnation area such as the corner nodes 2 and 3 in Fig. 3 , see Figs. 4 a and b . The changes in the through thickness direction for concentration and effective viscosity were further reected in the velocity proles as shown in Fig. 8. The migration of particles to the midplane resulted in an increase in effective viscosity. This in turns blunted the velocity proles at the midplane. With an increase in the initial particle concentration, the velocity proles became more blunted. This prediction is in agreement with the computational results of Brady 13 , who employed Stokesian dynamics method for viscous ows of concentrated suspensions exhibiting shear-induced particles migration.

3.6 Effect of the Mesh Size. In order to evaluate the sensitivity of the results with mesh size, three mesh sizes have been tested: i 146 elements, ii 384 elements as shown in Fig. 3 and iii 680 elements. The computational times were 96 s, 112 s, and 200 s on a PC586 Pentinum III RAM 284 Mb for cases i , ii , and iii , respectively. The evolution of pressure versus lling time at the gate has been plotted for the three cases in Fig. 9. The pressure at the gate was slightly higher for the coarse mesh cases i but there was little difference between cases ii , and iii . 3.7 Box Cavity. We have performed many numerical simulations for various three dimensional cavity geometries. As an example of showing its potential to new industrial PIM products, the nonisothermal numerical simulations of the lling stage for an iron box show in Fig. 10 will be presented in this investigation. Figures 11, 12, and 13 show melt front positions as a function of time, bulk temperature and powder concentration contours at the

Fig. 11 Predicted melt front during the lling stage

Journal of Manufacturing Science and Engineering

AUGUST 2003, Vol. 125 545

Fig. 12 Predicted bulk temperature distribution at the end of lling t 5 s

end of a cavity lling, respectively, when one gate, which is G, was employed. The lling time was 5 seconds, the maximum bulk temperature near the gate is the same as the injection temperature of 510 K, the minimum temperature was 438 K, and the maximum concentration in the corner of the box was found to be 0.47. With a uniform initial concentration of 0.45, and the minimum concentration was found to be 0.43.

Modifying the design by having two gates but keeping the volume ow rate the same as in the case for one gate. The bulk concentration of powder changed signicantly as shown in Fig. 14. This example demonstrated the potential of evaluating design changes using the present procedure such that a satisfactory design and processing conditions can be achieved.

Fig. 13 Predicted bulk powder concentration % distribution with D c D 0.66 and s 45% with one gate

546 Vol. 125, AUGUST 2003

Transactions of the ASME

Fig. 14 Predicted bulk powder concentration % distribution with D c D 0.66 and s 45% with two gates

Conclusions

In this investigation, a numerical model based on a FEM/FDM hybrid method has been developed to simulate the powder injection molding process with particle migration. Powder distribution can be predicted by shear-induced particle migration through the introduction of diffusion equation at the nodal control volume level. Thus, the model can predict the variation of powder density distribution which is ignored by the existing simulation packages. Particle migration reduced the pressure required for the process as viscous dissipation of energy was reduced. Preliminary simulation indicated that powder concentration variation could be signicant. Non-isothermal analysis indicated that most of the key parameters for lling process would change due to a change in powder concentration distribution. These numerical results elucidated the importance of particle migration on non-isothermal ow.

References
1 German, Randall M., 1991, Powder Injection Molding, Metal Powder Industries Federation, Princeton, N.J. 2 Hens, K. F., and Lee, D., 1991, Process Analysis of Injection Molding with Powder Products, Advances in Powder Metallurgy, MPIF, APMI, 2, p. 127. 3 Moller, James C., and Deeyong, L., 1994, Constitutive Behavior of A Powder/Binder System: Molding and Thermal Debinding, Int. J. Powder Metall., 30 1 , p. 103. 4 Kwon, T. H., and Park, J. B., 1995, Finite Element Analysis Modelling of Powder Injection Molding Filling Process Including Yield Stress and Slip Phenomena, Polym. Eng. Sci., 35, p. 741. 5 Wang, C. M., Leonard, R. L., and McCabe, T. J., 1993, Computational Analysis of Fluid Flow Injection Molding, Advances in Powder Metallurgy & Particulate Materials, 3, p. 31. 6 Rhee, B. O., 1992, Processing Behavior of Powder/Binder Mixtures in Powder Injection Molding-Binder Separation and Quick Freezing, PhD dissertation. 7 Najami, L. A., and Lee, D., 1994, Application of Mold Filling Simulation to Powder Injection Molding, Polym. Eng. Sci., 30, p. 231. 8 Najami, L. A., and Lee, D., 1991, Modelling of Mold Filling Process for Powder Injection Molding, Polym. Eng. Sci., 15, p. 1137. 9 Iwai, T., Aizawa, T., and Kihara, J., 1996, Powder-Binder Flow Simulation in

Powder Injection Molding, Proc. Powder Injection Molding Symp., MPIF. 10 Leighton, D., and Acrivos, A., 1987, The Shear-induced Self-diffusion in Concentrated Suspensions, J. Fluid Mech., 181, p. 415. 11 Leighton, D., and Acrivos, A., 1987, Measurement of Shear-induced Selfdiffusion in Concentrated Suspensions of Spheres, J. Fluid Mech., 177, p. 109. 12 Jenkins, J. T., and McTigue, D. F., 1990, Transport Processes in Concentrated Suspensions: The Role of Particle Fluctuation, Springer. 13 Nott, P. R., and Brady, J. F., 1994, Pressure-driven Flow of Suspensions: Simulation and Theory, J. Fluid Mech., 275, p. 157. 14 Phillips, R. J., 1992, A Constitutive Model for Concentrated Suspensions that Accounts for Shear-induced Particle Migration, Phys. Fluids A, 4, p. 31. 15 Karnis, A., Goldsmith, H. L., and Mason, S. G., 1996, The Kinetic of Flowing Dispersions: I Concentrated Suspensions of Rigid Particles, J. Colloid Interface Sci., 22, p. 531. 16 Averbakh, A., Shauly, A., Nir, A., and Semiat, R., 1997, Slow Viscous Flows of Highly Concentrated Suspensions-Part I: Laser-Doppler Velocimetry in Rectangular Ducts, Int. J. Multiphase Flow, 23, p. 409. 17 Koh, C., Leal, J. L. G., and Hookham, P. A., 1994, An Experiment Investigation of Concentrated Suspension Flow in a Rectangular Channel, J. Fluid Mech., 256 1 , p. 1. 18 Hieber, C. A., and Shen, S. F., 1980, A Finite-Element/Finite-Difference Simulation of the Injection-Molding Filling Process, J. Non-Newtonian Fluid Mech., 7 1 , p. 1. 19 Krieger, I. M., 1970, Rheology of Monodisperse Lattices, Adv. Colloid Interface Sci., 3, p. 111. 20 Lam, Y. C., Chen, X., Tan, K. W., Ma, J., Tam, K. C., and Yu, S. C. M., 2002, Experimental Measurements and Simulation of Particle Migration in Pressure-Driven Tube Flow: Application to Flow in Runners, Journal of Injection Molding Technology, 6 1 , p. 45. 21 Kordon, A. K., Pitchumani, R., Beris, A. N., Karbhari, V. M., and Dhurjati, P. S., 1993, A Rheological Model for Particulate Ceramic Slurries at Low Temperatures, Scr. Metall. Mater., 29, p. 1095. 22 Wang, V. W., Hieber, C. A., and Wang, K. K., 1985, An Interactive Simulation of Cavity in Injection Molding with Color Graphics, Proc. 43rd SPE ANTEC, pp. 826 829. 23 Wang, H. P., and Lee, H. S., 1989, Fundamentals of Computer Modeling in Polymer Processing, Ch. 8, p. 369, Tucker III C, ed., Hanser Publisher. 24 Tadmor, Z., and Gogos, C. G., 1979, Principles of Polymer Processing, New York. 25 Seifu, B., Nir, A., and Semiat, R., 1994, Viscous Dissipation Rate in Concentrated Suspensions, Phys. Fluids, 6, p. 3191.

Journal of Manufacturing Science and Engineering

AUGUST 2003, Vol. 125 547