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3D solid-modeling revolution has reached the design mainstream. While high-end 3D solid-modeling systems have been on engineers’
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workstation at large aerospace, consumer products, and automobile companies for years, many smaller companies are now making the
switch from workstations to PC. One reason for the shift is that the flexibility and advancement of Windows-native/NT has let software
developers create applications that are affordable and easy to use. High-end users are finding that mid-range solid modelers, such as
SolidWorks, have met their needs.7206
SolidWorks was chosen as the platform due to the Windows-native design environment, powerful assembly capabilities, ease-of-use,
rapid learning curve, and affordable price. A Windows-native 3D plastic injection mold designs system has been implemented on an NT
through interfacing Visual C++ codes with the commercial software, SolidWorks 99 and API. The system provides a designer with an
interactive computer-aided design environment, which can both speed up the mold design process and facilitate standardization.
© 2003 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.1. Introduction
With the broader use of plastics parts in a wide product
range, from consumer products to machinery, cars and air-
planes, the injection molding process has been recognized
as an important manufacturing process. The mold design
process is generally the critical path of a new product de-
velopment. Conventionally, mold design has always been a
much “mystified” art, requiring years of experience before
one can be relatively proficient in it. Due to the initial diffi-
culty in learning this art, less and less people are benefiting
from the experience and knowledge of the experts in this
field. To change the current situation, one way is to use a
computer-aided design (CAD) system.
CAD as an everyday term has grown to a broad range of
capabilities and has applications in fields ranging from edu-
cation for school teaching to three-dimensional mechanical
design. At the present time, most CAD systems provide
only the geometric modeling functions that facilitate the
drafting operations of mold design, and do not provide
mold designers with the necessary knowledge to design the
molds. Thus, much “add-on” software, e.g. IMOLD®,have
been developed on high-level 3D modeling platforms tofacilitate the mold design processes. Such an arrangement
is advantageous in many ways. The 3D modeling platform
provides plug-in software with a library of functions as well
as an established user interface and style of programming.
As a result, the development time for these “add-ons” is
significantly reduced.
IMOLD® (intelligent mold design) [1] is a knowledge-
based software application, which runs on the Unigraphics
SolidWorks platform and is carried out by using the User
Function provided. It is available on the UNIX and windows
operation system. For years, mold design engineers have
had to deal with two different systems, UNIX and PC. The
former is widely used in engineering applications whilst
the latter is used mainly in small and medium companies.
Engineers also need to run corporate office applications such
as word processing, spreadsheets, and project management
tools, but these were not on their UNIX workstations.
Fortunately, the remarkable development of computer
technology in the last decade has provided a way to change
this situation. The most significant change has been in
the area of computer hardware, i.e. the actual electronic
components associated with data processing, information
storage, and display technology, in terms of both speed
and memory. These have resulted in the more efficient use