best practices
November 2020’s Most-Viewed Articles
These articles garnered the most reader attention among stories posted in November 2020 by Plastics Technology: implementing automation, gauging residence time, the history of polymers and more.
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Troubleshooting Pressure Fluctuations in Piston-Type Melt Filters
Piston filtration offers many advantages over other systems. While pressure fluctuations could be regarded as their weakness, there are many ways to avoid them, both from the mechanical and the process side. Small adjustment can make a huge difference in the overall performance and efficiency of the system.
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How to Automate High-Precision ‘Micro’ Insert Molding
What does it take to automate a horizontal injection molding cell to handle micro-sized inserts and molded parts? General-purpose top-entry robots and tooling may not be up to the job.
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How to Plan and Implement Automation in an Injection Molding Plant
There is no “one size fits all” solution in automation. When considering what it would look like in your plant, hone in on the staff, products, space, and goals that are specific to you and the automation system that you will be installing.
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Residence Time and Residence-Time Distribution—Part 1 of 2
Failing to calculate and accurately account for residence time can compromise material integrity before it’s even injected.
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Injection Molding: Understand the Link Between Feed Throat Temperature & Bridging
Save time and money by properly controlling the feed-throat temperature. In some cases—but not all—it can help you solve a bridging problem.
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Shopping for a Barrel? Consider the Full Cost of Ownership
Beyond just the “invoice price” of a barrel, processors should consider factors like the composition of the inlay, quality of the backing material, straightness, concentricity, machining imperfections and packaging/handling, to understand the true cost of owning a barrel.
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'10 Things We’re Seeing in Machine Shops Right Now'
Metalworking shops and plastics plants make for interesting comparisons of their responses to the COVID-19 challenge.
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How to Know When Your Process is Ready to Make Acceptable Parts
Focus on six key metrics to help you determine when a process is lined out and stable enough to start production.
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