Product Strength and Orientation Manipulation via Vibration-Assisted Injection Molding
This investigation focuses on determining why polystyrene ASTM specimens exhibit an increase in tensile strength when processed by vibration assisted injection molding (VAIM) while polycarbonate parts do not. VAIM is one of several polymer processing methods that attempt to improve product properties via manipulation of the polymer melt. Observation of birefringence patterns in VAIM processed polystyrene samples show a significant impact on molecular orientation. The same studies were conducted on opaque polycarbonate and were unable to determine the degree of molecular orientation via birefringence measurement. It was theorized that VAIM did not produce significant orientation due to its higher thermal conductivity and stiffer backbone. It has been determined by this investigation that VAIM processing does impart significant molecular orientation in polycarbonate specimens but still does not increase its UTS. It is proposed that increased molecular orientation induced by VAIM processing inhibits crazes from growing into cracks. VAIM therefore favors polymers that fail by crazing (e.g., polystyrene) rather than those that fail by shear yielding (e.g., polycarbonate).