General Information On Blow Molding

By Genevive B. Mata


There are numerous procedures that go into manufacturing various goods. Blow molding is among those and is meant to produce hollow parts using plastic materials. Generally, there are three kinds done in this process: injection stretch, injection, extrusion.

The procedure starts with plastic being melted. This is then formed into a parison or preform. The latter refers to that which applies to injection stretch and injection practices. The parison is a plastic, tube-shaped piece that has a hole at the end in which compressed air is designed to pass through. This clamps to the mold and air is then blown inside. Pressure from the air is enough to push the plastic out to fit the mold. After being cooled and hardening, the mold opens and is then ejected.

William Kopitke and Enoch Ferngren are credited as the first to have used this process. The concept behind the technique is nothing new and is based off glassblowing. The two men built a blow-molding device and in the later half of the 1930s, sold it to the Hartford Empire Company. This move would lead to the eventual popularity of the process commercially.

Limitations of variety and number in the products meant that this process did not become popularized until later. Once variety and production rates grew, the number of the goods increased as well. In the United States soft-drink industry, the plastic bottles that were made in 1977 was zero. The number increased to ten billion by 1999. In the modern day, even more products are being blown, a number that is expected to increase as time goes.

There are multiple typologies with this practice. Extrusion process, also known as EBM, involves the plastic being melted and later extruded in a tube that is hollowed out. The process might be intermittent or continuous. The kinds of products typically made with this approach: watering cans, automotive ducting, milk bottles, polyethylene hollow products, shampoo bottles and more.

Injection, or IBM, is employed for production of hollow glass, as well as plastic objects in big quantities. With this process, polymer is injection molded on a core pin, which is rotated to another station to be inflated and later cooled. This is the least used process of the three different kinds. There are two different methods commonly used for the injection stretch process: single and two stage.

There are disadvantages and advantages associated with the three different types of molding. Likewise, these are employed for the manufacturing of different parts. The practice, as a whole, has become more common and is employed in numerous industries of today.




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