When the mold with the conventional

When the mold with the conventional cooling channels was run, the cycle time had to be 56 s to obtain the same part quality as that molded with the optimized conformal cooling channels. The mold opening and closing times were the same in both cases, meaning the cooling phase lasted 42 s. The mold surface temperature was measured as 68.0 °C immediately after the ejection phase; this was 26.8 °C higher than that of the conformal cooling channels. It can thus be seen that the cycle time cannot be reduced. When the mold temperature at the end of the ejection phase was 68.0 °C, the average mold temperature during the cooling phase may come nearer to the ejection temperature. As a result, the required time for solidification was increased. If we removed the molded part after 28 s of cooling time, the mold temperature was measured as 80.5 °C and the molded part was not completely solidified, as shown in Fig. 12b.