IMC

Get more out of the material: processing expertise during preparation

Whether automotive manufacturing, the packaging industry, the electrical and electronics industry or food production—molded articles made of plastics freely combined with all kinds of reinforcement material, fibers or fillers are used everywhere. The IMC process developed by KraussMaffei provides you with completely new prospects for compounding and injecting your own product-specific formulations in a single-stage process. It is suitable for practically all applications in which various components are mixed and have to be formed three-dimensionally.

Your benefits:

  • Incredibly short dry cycle times and fast cycles
  • Long-term reduction in raw material costs
  • Improved article quality using fibers and fillers

The injection molding compounder (IMC) from KraussMaffei perfectly links the continuous extrusion process with the discontinuous injection molding process. This setup protects the material by processing at one temperature. The process starts with individual materials being metered by mass. The plasticized and homogenized material moves from the extruder into the barrel of the injection unit via a heated runner. In the injection and holding pressure phase, the extruder continuously supplies the material through a buffer to ensure consistent formulation quality. The material is shaped in the twin-platen clamping unit on one of the standard CX or MX series injection molding machines from KraussMaffei.

The plasticizing and injection unit plays a critical technical role and is engineered for the altered requirements. Instead of a single-screw unit which both plasticizes and injects, the IMC has a twin screw that handles plasticizing and a piston for injection. The twin screw for processing rotating in the same direction provides additional function element such as weighing, metering and conveying devices, a melt buffer, transfer valve, shot pot injection unit and shut-off nozzle. The twin-platen clamping unit used in the IMC injection molding compounder lets you take advantage of short locking times with precise positioning, allowing you to implement incredibly short dry cycle times and fast cycles.

The IMC process makes it possible to purchase less expensive raw materials, initiate compounding tailored to the application and run small production series. This lowers your costs over the long term. The special process engineering for the injection molding compounder (IMC) also improves article quality, particularly when using fibers and fillers. The single-stage process where the material is only plasticized and processed once and kept at one temperature is more gentle than a conventional two-stage approach. Fibers are continuously fed into the melt, which results in longer fibers. The IMC process provides a tremendous increase in flexibility for you in the ways it lets you process and create new combinations of a vast assortment of materials, from blends to real reinforcing agents to all conceivable fillers.

KraussMaffei IMC Teknolojisi