• Design & Manufacturing
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.48-53
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• 2008

We injection molded a thin type of plate and wedge type of plate with micro prizm patterns on its surface and investigated the fidelity of replication of the micro pattern depending on the process parameter such as mold temperature, melt temperature, injection rate or packing pressure. The size of the $90^{\circ}$ prizm pattern is $50{\mu}m$ and the size of the plate is about $335mm{\times}213mm$ and $400mm{\times}400mm$. The thicknesses are 2.6mm and 0.7mm at each edge of the wedge type of plate and 1mm at each edge of the thin type of plate. The fidelity of the replication turned out quite different according to the process parameters and location of the patterns on the plate. We measured the cavity pressure and temperature in real-time during the molding to analyze the effect of the local melt pressure and temperature on the micro pattern replication.

• Design & Manufacturing
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.1-7
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• 2017

The fabrication process of micro pattern structure with high precision and high aspect ratio using powder injection molding (PIM) is developed. In the PIM process, the metal powder is mixed with the binder systems and the mixture is injected into the metal mold. The injection molded green parts are debinded and sintered to reach final shape and properties. In this method, the optimization of physical properties such as fluidity and strength of the binder system is essential for perfect filling the high aspect ratio micro-pattern. For this purpose, the correlation between the properties of the binder system and feedstock and ${\mu}-PIM$ process was investigated, and a binder system with low viscosity at low temperature(about $110^{\circ}C$) and high strength after cooling was investigated and applied. Employing this process, high precision parts with line type micro pattern structure which has pattern size $160{\mu}m$ and aspect ratio more than 2 can be manufactured.

• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.49 no.1
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• pp.32-39
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• 2011

The present investigation was performed on the die compaction and sintering behavior of Fe micro-nano mixed powder with a mixed binder for powder injection molding. Warm die compaction of the feedstock for simulation of the static injection molding process was conducted using a cylindrical mold of 10 mm diameter at $100^{\circ}C$ under 4MPa. The die compaction of the micro-nanopowder feedstock underwent a uniform molding behavior showing a homogeneous distribution of nanopowders among the micropowders without porosity and distortion. After debinding, the powder compact maintained a uniform structure without crack and distortion, leading to a high green density of 64.2% corresponding to the initial powder loading of 65%. The sintering experiment showed that the micro-nanopowder compact underwent a near full and isotropic densification process during sintering. It was observed that the nanopowders effectively suppressed the growth of micropowder grains during densification process. Conclusively, the use of nanopowder for PIM feedstock might provide a new concept for processing a full density PIM parts with fine microstructure.

• Proceedings of the Korean Powder Metallurgy Institute Conference
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• 2006.09a
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• pp.93-94
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• 2006

A novel production method for porous metal components has been developed by applying powder space holder (PSH) method to metal powder injection molding (MIM) process. The PSH-MIM method has an industrial competitive advantage that is capable of net-shape manufacturing the micro-sized porous metal products with complicated shapes and controlled porosity and pore size. In this study, the small impeller with homogeneous micro-porous structure was manufactured by the PSH-MIM method. The effects of combinations in size and fraction of PMMA particle on dimensional tolerance and variation of sintered porous specimens were investigated. It was concluded that the PSH-MIM method could manufacture commercially microporous metal components with high dimensional accuracy.

• Proceedings of the Korean Powder Metallurgy Institute Conference
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• 2006.09a
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• pp.43-44
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• 2006

The production method of micro sacrificial plastic mold insert metal injection molding, namely ${\mu}-SPiMIM$ process has been proposed to solve specific problems involving the miniaturization of MIM. Two types of sacrificial plastic molds (SP-mold) with fine structures were used: 1) PMMA resist, 2) PMMA mold injected into Ni-electroform, which is a typical LIGA (${\underline{L}}ithographie-{\underline{G}}alvanoformung-{\underline{A}}bformung$) process. Stainless steel 316L feedstock was injection-molded into the SP-molds with multi-pillar structures. This study focused on the effects of metal particle size and processing conditions on the shrinkage, transcription and surface roughness of sintered parts.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Technology of Plasticity Conference
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• 2005.05a
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• pp.51-54
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• 2005

Light Guide Plate (LGP) of LCD-BLU(Back Light Unit) is manufactured by forming optical pattern with $5\~100um$ in diameter on the LGP by means of sand blasting or etching method. However, in order to improve the luminance of LCD-LGP, the design of optical pattern has introduced UV inclined-exposure process in this study. This micro-optical pattern, which has asymmetric elliptical column shaped pattern, can change low viewing-angle to high viewing-angle, as well as it contribute to diffusion of light. As a result, this type of micro-optical pattern can introduce the highly luminance. The PR structure obtained in the stage of lithography has asymmetric elliptical column shape and it is processed into a micro-optical pattern. Optical design with this kind of micro-optical pattern, mold fabrication by electroplating and LGP molding with injection molding are under way.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2000.05a
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• pp.1043-1046
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• 2000

By combination of X-ray lithography, electroplating and molding process, various microstructures have been produced. Specially, the alignment grooves for multi-fibers with submicron accuracy have been produced. This paper described a fabrication process of LICA molds and micro molding technique by using LIGA molds. The accuracy of the fabricated LIGA molds was less than 0.4${\mu}{\textrm}{m}$. The injection molded alignment grooves were very precise and had me surface roughness so that they could be successfully applicable to optical systems.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.471-475
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• 2006

Filling the microchannels is very important in designing micro-injection molding, microdevices, etc. In this paper, flow dynamics was studied in injection molding with microchannels. A transparent PMMA mold was designed and the flow dynamics was observed. The experiment was performed using poly (ethylene oxide) (PEO) and polyacrylamide (PA) aqueous solutions. The transignt dynamic flow and flow competition between the base plate and the microchannels were observed. The flow observation was used to explain previous filling length results in microchannels during micro-injection molding.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
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• v.23 no.9 s.186
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• pp.61-67
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• 2006

Sandwich structures, which are composed of a thick core between two faces, are commonly used in many engineering applications because they combine high stiffness and strength with low weight. Accordingly, the usage of sandwich structure is very widely applied to the aircraft, the automobile and marine industry, etc., because of these advantages. In this paper, we have investigated the buckling protection of an inner structure plate and the useful corrugated configuration for contact, and the fabrication method of the inner structure plate for large area using the continuous molding process. Also, we have guaranteed the accuracy of the molding process through the micro corrugated mold fabrication and secured the accuracy and analyzed aspect properties of the inner structure plate fabricated for a large area using the partial mold process. We have compared molding simulation according to the aspect thickness of the corrugated configuration with the molding experiment results.

• Composite Materials and Engineering
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.221-239
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• 2021

This paper presents a multiscale modeling method for sheet molding compound (SMC) composites through a novel bundle packing reconstruction algorithm based on a micro-CT (Computed Tomography) image processing. Due to the complex flow pattern during the compression molding process, the SMC composites show a spatially varying orientation and overlapping of fiber bundles. Therefore, significant inhomogeneity and anisotropy are commonly observed and pose a tremendous challenge to predicting SMC composites' properties. For high-fidelity modeling of the SMC composites, the statistical distributions for the fiber orientation and local volume fraction are characterized from micro-CT images of real SMC composites. After that, a novel bundle packing reconstruction algorithm for a high-fidelity SMC model is proposed by considering the statistical distributions. A method for evaluating specimen level's strength and stiffness is also proposed from a set of high-fidelity SMC models. Finally, the proposed multiscale modeling methodology is experimentally validated through a tensile test.