Effectiveness of Blowing Agents in the Cellular Injection Molding Process

Abstract

The study was undertaken to investigate the effect of the type and content of blowing agents in the polymeric materials being processed on the structure and selected physical and mechanical properties of the obtained injection molded parts. In the study of the cellular injection molding process, three standard and generally available thermoplastics were used. In the experiments, the blowing agent content (0–2.0% by mass, i.e. 0, 0.4, 0.8 and 2.0% (wt)) fed into the polymer being processed was adopted as a variable factor. In the present study, the blowing agents with the endothermic decomposition characteristics and exothermic decomposition characteristics, coming in a granulated form with a diameter ranging from 1.2 to 3 mm were used. Based on the results of investigating porosity, porous structure image analysis as well as microscopic examination of the structure was shown. It has been found, that the favorable content of the blowing agent in the polymeric material should be of up to 0.8% wt.. With such content of the blowing agent in the polymeric material, favorable strength properties are retained in porous parts, the pore distribution is uniform and the pores have similar sizes.