What is Mold Flow Analysis?
What is Mold Flow Analysis?
Mold flow analysis (MFA) is a software simulation showing how plastic will flow through a mold. Once a mold design is complete MFA is used to determine the number of gates and their locations, show material choke points and hot spots, predict short fill and sink mark locations, and many other critical parameters needed to optimize a mold design for a repeatable, consistent molding process.
This analysis is vital to predicting what to anticipate during the molding process including:
1. Mold life expectancy
2. Overall expense of the mold
3. How to avoid any obstacles
Mold flow analysis (MFA) is a software simulation showing how plastic will flow through a mold. Once a mold design is complete MFA is used to determine the number of gates and their locations, show material choke points and hot spots, predict short fill and sink mark locations, and many other critical parameters needed to optimize a mold design for a repeatable, consistent molding process.
This analysis is vital to predicting what to anticipate during the molding process including:
- Shrinkage compensation for tooling tolerances
- Warpage issues
- Handling conditions
- Material Temperature and shot parameter optimization
- Flow-induced shear stress
- Weld line area
- Mold and Coolant temperature
- And more
1. Mold life expectancy
2. Overall expense of the mold
3. How to avoid any obstacles