Development status and technology trend

Since the reform and opening up, with the rapid development of the national economy, the market demand for mold is growing. The mould industry has been developing rapidly with a growth rate of about 15%. The ownership components of mould industry enterprises have also changed dramatically. In addition to state-owned professional mould factories, collective, joint venture, sole proprietorship and private enterprises have also developed rapidly. In Ningbo and Huangyan, Zhejiang Province, "the town of mould"; in Guangdong Province, some large group companies and rapidly rising township enterprises, such as Kelong, Midea and Kangjia, have set up their own mould manufacturing centers; there are thousands of mould enterprises with Sino foreign joint ventures and wholly foreign investment. With the rapid pace of international integration and the increasingly fierce market competition, people have realized the importance of product quality, cost and new product development ability. Mold manufacturing is one of the most basic elements in the whole chain. Many mould enterprises have increased their investment in technological progress, which is regarded as an important driving force for the development of enterprises. Some domestic mold enterprises have popularized PDX software interface and 2D CAD, and have successively started to use international general software such as Pro / E, PDX, UG NX, NX progressive die design, I-DEAS, Euclid is, logopress3, 3dquickpress, moldworks and topsolid progress, and some manufacturers have also introduced such CAE software as Moldflow, C-flow, DYNAFORM, Optis, and margasoft, which have been successfully applied to stamping Mold design.

The manufacturing technology of large stamping die represented by automobile panel die has made great progress. Dongfeng Motor Company Die Factory, FAW die center and other die manufacturers have been able to produce some car panel dies. In addition, many research institutions and colleges carry out the research and development of mold technology. After years of hard work, we have made remarkable progress in Die CAD / CAE / CAM technology, and made contributions in improving die quality and shortening die design and manufacturing cycle.

For example, KMAS software for stamping analysis of automobile panel independently developed by Jilin University automobile panel forming technology institute, CAD / CAE / CAM software for injection mold, automobile panel mold and progressive mold developed by the State Key Laboratory of mold technology of Huazhong University of science and technology, cold stamping mold and fine blanking Research Center developed by the National Engineering Research Center of mold CAD of Shanghai Jiaotong University The CAD software of fine blanking die has many users in the domestic die industry.

Although China's mold industry has made remarkable development in the past decade, there is still a big gap between China and developed countries in many aspects. For example, the proportion of precision processing equipment in mold processing equipment is relatively low; the popularity of CAD / CAE / CAM technology is not high; many advanced mold technologies are not widely used, and so on, resulting in a considerable number of large, precision, complex and long-life molds relying on imports.

Future development trend

The development of mould technology should meet the requirements of "short delivery time", "high precision", "good quality" and "low price" of mould products.

(1) Comprehensively popularize CAD / CAM / CAE Technology

Die CAD / CAM / CAE technology is the development direction of die design and manufacturing. With the development and progress of computer software, the conditions for popularizing CAD / CAM / CAE technology are basically mature. Enterprises will increase the strength of CAD / CAM technology training and technical services, and further expand the application scope of CAE technology. The development of computer and network is making it possible for CAD / CAM / CAE technology to spread across regions, enterprises and institutes in the whole industry, to realize the re integration of technical resources, and to make virtual manufacturing possible.

(2) High speed milling

The development of high-speed milling in foreign countries has greatly improved the machining efficiency and obtained high surface finish. In addition, it can also process high hardness module, and has the advantages of low temperature rise and small thermal deformation. The development of high-speed milling technology has injected new vitality into the manufacturing of large-scale cavity mould in automobile and home appliance industries. It has developed towards higher agility, intelligence and integration.

(3) Mould scanning and digital system

The high-speed scanner and the mold scanning system provide many functions from the model or the physical object scanning to the processing of the desired model, which greatly shortens the mold development and manufacturing cycle. Some fast scanning systems can be quickly installed on the existing CNC milling machine and machining center to realize fast data acquisition, automatic generation of processing programs of different CNC systems, and CAD data of different formats, which can be used in "reverse engineering" of mold manufacturing industry. Mold scanning system has been successfully applied in automobile, motorcycle, home appliances and other industries, and it is believed that it will play a greater role during the Tenth Five Year Plan period.

(4) EDM milling

EDM milling technology is also known as EDM generative machining technology, which is a new technology to replace the traditional forming electrode for machining cavity. It is a simple tubular electrode with high-speed rotation for three-dimensional or two-dimensional contour machining (like CNC milling), so it is no longer necessary to manufacture complex forming electrode, which is obviously a significant development in the field of EDM. Foreign machine tools using this technology have been used in mold processing. It is expected that this technology will be developed.

(5) Improve the degree of mold standardization

The degree of die standardization in our country is increasing. It is estimated that the coverage rate of die standard parts in our country has reached about 30%. Generally, 80% of developed countries abroad.

(6) High quality materials and advanced surface treatment technology

It is necessary to select high quality steel and apply the corresponding surface treatment technology to improve the service life of the die. Whether the heat treatment and surface treatment of the die can give full play to the key link of the material properties of the die steel. The development direction of die heat treatment is vacuum heat treatment. In addition to the improvement of die surface treatment, advanced technologies such as vapor deposition (tin, tic, etc.) and plasma spraying should be developed.

(7) Mould grinding and polishing will be automatic and intelligent

The quality of die surface has a great influence on the service life of die and the appearance quality of parts. It is an important development trend to study the automatic and intelligent grinding and polishing methods to replace the existing manual operation in order to improve the quality of die surface.

(8) The development of mould automatic processing system

This is the long-term development goal of our country. The mould automatic processing system shall be equipped with reasonable combination of multiple machine tools, accompanying positioning fixture or positioning disk, complete CNC Library of machines and tools, complete CNC flexible synchronous system and quality monitoring and control system.