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SAE TECHNICAL PAPER SERIES 1999-01-0851 The Effect of Internal Lubricants on the Accuracy of Injection Molded Thermoplastic Gears Edward H. Williams III LNP Engineering Plastics Roderick E. Kleiss Kleiss Gears Reprinted From: Plastic Components, Processes, and Technology (SP-1410) International Congress and Exposition Detroit, Michigan March 1-4, 1999 Downloaded from SAE International by University of Michigan, Wednesday, October 29, 2014 The appearance of this ISSN code at the bottom of this page indicates SAEs consent that copies of the paper may be made for personal or internal use of specific clients. This consent is given on the condition, however, that the copier pay a $7.00 per article copy fee through the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc. Operations Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923 for copying beyond that permitted by Sec- tions 107 or 108 of the U.S. Copyright Law. 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ABSTRACT This paper will examine the effect that PTFE, silicone and other internal lubricants have on the mold shrink rate of thermoplastic gear materials and the resulting effect on the accuracy of the molded gear. "Standard" thermoplas- tic mold shrinkage data is generated on relatively large test samples which do not represent the flow, orientation and heat transfer seen in a typical molded gear. Addi- tionally, different parts of the gear can be expected to shrink at different rates, leading to potential errors if a sin- gle "generic" mold shrink rate is used to design and machine the gear mold cavity. Using a single cavity gear mold, the shrink rate of different internally lubricated gear materials is measured and compared to the unlubricated base resin. The shrink rate of individual parts of the gear are compared, as well as the resultant total composite variation. A discussion on the techniques used to mea- sure the gears, as well as the expected consequences of the resultant shrinkage on the gear train, will be included. This data can be used to increase the accuracy of molded thermoplastic gears. INTRODUCTION The use of engineering thermoplastic resins like nylon 6/ 6 and acetal to reduce cost, noise and weight in automo- tive actuators has become common. Gear designers are also considering thermoplastic compounds that have had their performance enhanced by the addition of inter- nal reinforcements and lubricants. While these com- pounds are often selected as the primary candidate for an application, it is also common for the compound to be used to solve a problem in an existing application origi- nally specified in an unlubricated thermoplastic material. In these situations, the lubricated compound is usually molded in the existing tooling without modification. It has been customary to consider the effect of internal lubri- cants on mold shrinkage as negligible in most gearing applications because the parts are usually small, and many applications have successfully used internally lubri- cated materials in replacement of non-lubricated materi- als. But as gear designers begin considering lubricated materials in the initial design stage, the effect of mold shrinkage on gear elements becomes increasingly impor- tant. THERMOPLASTIC MOLD SHRINKAGE Typically, the mold shrinkage values given for a material have been determined by measuring the shrinkage of a 5" x 1/2" x 1/8" rectangular bar measured in accordance to ASTM D-955 test methods. These values are usually given corresponding to the dimension parallel (flow) and perpendicular (transverse) to the direction of melt flow in the part. They are normally expressed as "inch/inch" or sometimes as a percentage. These mold shrinkage val- ues can be useful in comparing the relative shrink rate of one material to another, but they should not be treated as absolutes. Mold shrinkage can and will vary with part thickness, mold layout, processing variations, and mold temperature. Of greater value is mold shrinkage data collected on an actual part, whether it be a simple prototype mold or a similar application. It was this approach that was used to study the effect internal lubricants has on the mold shrinkage of different parts of a gear, and how that shrinkage would affect the overall accuracy of the gear. MATERIALS AND LUBRICANTS To explore the effect of internal lubricants on the accu- racy of injection molded gears, it was desirable to look at both crystalline and amorphous resins. The crystalline resins nylon 6/6 (PA 6/6) and acetal (POM), and the amorphous resin polycarbonate (PC) were chosen for this study. Crystalline materials will generally have much higher shrinkage rates than amorphous materials. The molecular structure of crystalline materials allows the polymer chains to align in an ordered structure as the molecules cool. This alignment allows a greater amount Downloaded from SAE International by University of Michigan, Wednesday, October 29, 2014 2 of shrinkage, and imparts some directionality to the shrinkage (anisotropic shrinkage). Conversely, an amor- phous resins molecular structure does not allow the chains to align and the orientation remains random. This random orientation results in less overall shrinkage with little directionality (isotropic shrinkage). The internal lubricants chosen for this study were PTFE, silicone, combinations of PTFE and silicone, and four proprietary, non-PTFE/silicone alloys. PTFE and silicone are widely used in thermoplastic compounds to reduce wear and friction in all types of thermoplastics. Recent work in low cost lubricant systems have resulted in sev- eral different alloy systems in acetal, nylon and polycar- bonate compounds. Table 1 lists the specific materials used in this study. MOLD AND GEAR DESIGN A standard 3-plate mold design was chosen with 3 sym- metrical pin gates for injecting the plastic. A three-plate mold has the advantage of separating the runner from the part in the mold press and it allows an axial injection path for the plastic, which results in a more concentric gear. The gear cavity itself was designed as a simple laminate disk that was doweled into the mold base. This simple disk has no other features than the gear cavity shape. By designing the cavity in this fashion, the gear shape could be modified quite easily for additional stud- ies of other gear forms or to mold exact parts from differ- ent shrinkage materials. The gear itself was designed as a 26 tooth, 24 Diametral Pitch, 20 degree AGMA class PT-1 tooth form. The size and shape of the gear were chosen to represent a rea- sonable approximate size to many of the plastic gears that are on the market today. The PT-1 tooth form is very similar to the AGMA fine pitch gear with the exception of its root geometry, which has a larger fillet radius for added strength. Since many materials would be molded in the same cavity with many different shrink rates, the gear cavity was sized for the highest shrinkage material; other materials processed in the same cavity would all be larger than the initial target gear. INSPECTION Inspection of plastic gears must necessarily begin with the cavity, since gear shrinkage can only be understood by knowing the exact geometry of the form from which it shrinks. For this study the gear cavity was constructed with the following dimensions and estimations of shrink- age for unlubricated acetal homopolymer: Mold Temp. = 200F The target dimensions for the molded gear after shrink- age and the actual measured dimension of first part sam- ples from the mold are tabulated below in Table 3. Since this cavity was intended for general purpose mold- ing of varied materials, further refinement of molded gear dimensions was not warranted at this time. Table 1. Materials Tested Material Description K-1000 D Unlubricated acetal homopolymer KL-4040 D 20% PTFE, acetal homopolymer K-1000 Unlubricated acetal copolymer KL-4410 2% silicone, acetal copolymer KL-4040 20% PTFE, acetal copolymer KL-4540 2% silicone, 18% PTFE, acetal copolymer Lubriloy K proprietary lubricated acetal alloy Lubriloy KL proprietary lubricated acetal alloy R-1000 unlubricated nylon 6/6 RL-4030 15% PTFE , nylon 6/6 RF-1006 30% glass fiber, nylon 6/6 RFL-4036 15% PTFE, 30% glass fiber, nylon 6/6 RA-1002 10% aramid fiber, nylon 6/6 RAL-4022 10% aramid fiber, 10% PTFE, nylon 6/6 Lubriloy RW proprietary lubricated nylon 6/6 alloy D-1000 unlubricated polycarbonate DL-4030 15% PTFE, polycarbonate DF-1006 30% glass fiber, polycarbonate DFL-4036 15% PTFE, 30% glass fiber, polycarbonate Lubriloy D-EP proprietary lubricated, high flow polycarbonate alloy Table 2. Cut Dimension (in) Shrinkage Estimate (in/in) Actual Shrinkage (in/in) Number of teeth 26 Diametral Pitch 23.14 0.037 0.036 Pressure Angle 20 Tooth Thickness 0.0650 -0.0069 0.005 Outside Diameter 1.2057 0.035 0.0340 Root Diameter 1.0076 0.038 0.0369 Table 3. Target Actual Diametral Pitch 24 23.98 Pressure Angle 20 20 Tooth Thickness (in) .06545 .0647 Outside Diameter (in) 1.1667 1.1647 Root Diameter (in) 0.972 0.9704 Downloaded from SAE International by University of Michigan, Wednesday, October 29, 2014 3 Profile inspection of both gears and cavities was per- formed on an analog scanning coordinate measurement machine. This machine has an NIST traceable volumetric accuracy of 40 inches with a resolution of 4 inches. Complete profile scans were taken of all teeth for both the cavity and the gear. This is necessary for wire EDMd cavities since a machining anomaly can occur anywhere in this non-generative gear cutting process. We devel- oped our own software to analyze the data for shrinkage, eccentricity, tooth form, and tooth thickness. In addition to profile measurement, we roll-tested the molded unlubricated acetal homopolymer gears with a custom wire EDM master gear. This gear was designed with a low number of teeth in order to accentuate tooth- to-tooth variations due to shrinkage variations. Roll testing is incapable of accurately determining the geometric accuracy of molded plastic gears, but it is invaluable as a process capability check, and as a deter- minant of eccentricity and lobing. Since we molded many materials with many different shrinkages in a single cav- ity, we were unable to use this 24DP master gear for most of our inspections. In point of fact we rolled the plastic gears against themselves as a redundant check on mea- surements gained through profile inspection. The examination of roll testing results with gear profile analysis also points out another fallacy in trying to define molded plastic gears in terms of their cut metal gear counterparts. Test pitch radius, the radius to the gears theoretical pitch circle, which is a dominant descriptive feature in cut metal gears, has much less meaning for molded gears since the pitch radius varies as a function of shrinkage. It is much simpler and more meaningful to define the gear with reference to its basic definable geo- metric features. ANALYSIS The measured gear dimensions were compared to the measured dimensions of the mold cavity to determine the amount of shrinkage for each material. The mold tem- perature for the materials that were to be compared was held constant, so shrink rates would not influence the resultant measurements. Table 4 lists the mold tempera- ture and measured dimensions for each of the materi- als. Table 5 lists the resultant mold shrinkage and Table 6 lists the difference in the measured dimensions of the lubricated material to its unlubricated base resin. It is clear from the data collected that adding and internal lubricant to a material, whether the unreinforced base resin or a reinforced compound, will change the mold shrink rate of the compound. The shrink rate was also different for the five "components" measured, with the greatest differences being between the "bulk" features (outside diameter, root diameter, base circle diameter) and "fine" features (tooth thickness, tooth height). The overall mold shrinkage rate measured in the gears was greater than the mold shrinkage rate measured using ASTM type procedures, which reinforces the caution against using standard shrinkage values to cut gear cavi- ties. The general effect of adding lubricants can be sum- marized as follows: PTFE Adding 20% PTFE to either copolymer or homopolymer acetal reduced the shrinkage rate for all the individual gear components except tooth height, which increased. Adding 15% PTFE to unfilled nylon 6/6 increased the shrink rate for all components, most likely due to a slight nucleating effect from the PTFE particles. Adding 15% PTFE to a 30% glass fiber reinforced nylon 6/6 had the same effect, except the shrink rate in the tooth height was decreased. Adding 10% PTFE to a 10% aramid fiber reinforced nylon 6/6 gave similar results as adding PTFE to acetal, the overall effect being to reduce the shrink rate for all components except tooth height, which increased. Adding 15% PTFE to unfilled polycarbonate reduced the shrink rate in the tooth height and tooth thickness, but increased the rate in the other components. Adding 15% PTFE to 30% glass fiber reinforced polycarbonate reduced the shrink rate in all components except the base circle diameter. SILICONE Silicone was only evaluated in the acetal copolymer. Adding 2% silicone to an acetal copolymer slightly reduced the shrink rate of all tooth components. Silicone had the smallest and most uniform effect on gear shrinkage of all the lubricants evaluated in acetal. A combination of 2% silicone and 18% PTFE in acetal copolymer reacted similarly to just 20% PTFE. ALLOYS As expected, the low cost, non-PTFE/silicone alloy lubrication systems worked differently in each base resin, because a different system is used in each one. The net effect in acetal was the same as PTFE, reducing the shrinkage rate for all the individual gear components except tooth height, but to a lesser extent. This should be expected, since the total amount of lubricant in the alloy products is less than the PTFE lubricated samples. The results for the nylon 6/6 based alloy system was an increase in shrink rate over unfilled nylon 6/6, except for the shrinkage in the tooth height, which increased. The polycarbonate based alloy showed a reduction in shrink rate for all gear components except root diameter. EFFECT ON GEAR MESH Measuring the different shrink rates is useful for understanding how a gear cavity might be cut to accommodate different material combina- tions, but how does it effect the engineer who wants to substitute a lubricated material for an already designed unlubricated gear in production. As stated before, these situations are common applications for lubricated ther- moplastic compounds and have been successful. The effect of the change in shrinkage is primarily to change the amount of backlash in the system. Downloaded from SAE International by University of Michigan, Wednesday, October 29, 2014 4 For example, our test mold was designed to mold acetal homopolymer at 180F to give a 24 diametral pitch gear with 26 teeth using the AGMA PT-1 tooth form. Meshed against itself at "standard" center distance of 1.0830" it should have 0.0028" of backlash. Our actual molded gear was 23.944 diametral pitch, with an outside diame- ter of 1.1666" and a tooth thickness of 0.0637". Mounting this gear at the previous "standard" center distance results in only 0.0016" of backlash. A 20% PTFE filled acetal homopolymer, molded in the same mold at the same temperature resulted in a gear with a 23.834 diametral pitch, 1.1719" outside diameter and a tooth thickness of 0.0064". This gear, mounted on the original 1.0830" standard center distance would now have - 0.0024" of backlash and could not be mounted, let alone operate. The good news is that gears are seldom designed to operate at "standard" center distances. The center dis- tance is usually increased over standard to compensate for variations in the gear housing, runout in the gears, temperature and humidity variation, and other tolerance concerns. It is also possible to change the mold shrink- age rate of a material by varying process conditions like mold temperature and cooling time. Taking advantage of these factors often allows material substitutions to work in the existing gear train using existing tooling. The caveat to gear designers is that the gears are not the same as the original gears, and more than likely they will be running at reduced center distances, with less back- lash, and greater specific sliding ratios. EFFECT ON ACCURACY To evaluate the accuracy of the molded gears, it would be common to roll the gears against a 24 diametral pitch master gear and compare the total composite variation and tooth-tooth error in the gears. Using this technique can be misleading, since the molded gears are not actually 24 diametral pitch and will not properly mesh with the master gear. It is, however, the method most commonly used to evaluate the molded parts. When the unfilled acetal homopolymer gear was rolled against a 24 diametral pitch master (48 teeth), it had a total composite error of 0.0011" and a tooth-to-tooth error of 0.0006", and could be classified as an AGMA Q10. The 20% PTFE lubricated acetal homopolymer gear molded in the same cavity at the same process condi- tions gave a 0.0014" total composite error and 0.0006" tooth-to-tooth error, and could be classified as an AGMA Q9. Despite being rather accurate molded plastic gears, both gears maximum test radius exceeded the calculated "standard" test radius expected from 24 diametral pitch, 26 tooth gears with standard tooth profile. The unfilled acetal homopolymer was 0.0018" larger, and the 20% PTFE lubricated acetal homopolymer was 0.0054" larger. The reason for the larger than expected test radius is two fold. Not only are the gears larger in diameter, but the diametral pitch of the molded gear and the master gear no longer match. The mold shrinkage "errors" have resulted in the diametral pitch of the gears to be smaller than the 24 diametral pitch master, so the teeth of the molded gears will not drop fully into the spaces between the master gear teeth. This mismatch, plus the increased diameters of the molded gears, combine to increase the test radius of the gear when mated with a "standard" master gear. CONCLUSION The overall effect of adding a lubricant to a gear material is to reduce the shrinkage, resulting in a larger gear. If the molded part is thicker than an ASTM test sam- ple (1/8"), then the shrink rate will be larger than that reported for a standard ASTM shrink specimen. The rate of shrinkage for any one material is different for different components of the gear. The main effect of lubricants on accuracy is to increase the test radius of the gear and to enhance the lobing effect created by the weld/meld lines. REFERENCES 1. "The Effect of Filler, Wall Thickness and Geometry on Shrinkage and Warpage of Engineering Thermo- plastics" Josh McIlvaine, LNP Engineering Plastics, Inc. CONTACT Edward H. Williams has a B.S. in Polymer Science from The Pennsylvania State University, and is a 12 year employee of LNP Engineering Plastics, a custom com- pounder of engineering thermoplastics. His e-mail address is Ed_Williams @ lnp.com. You can learn more about LNP at their web site http:\\ www.lnp.com Roderick E. Kleiss is President of Kleiss Gears, Inc. He has a Masters degree in Mechanical Engineering from Michigan Technological University. His e-mail address is kleiss @ kleissgears.com. You can learn more about Kleiss gears at their web site http://www.kleissgears.com Downloaded from SAE International by University of Michigan, Wednesday, October 29, 2014 5 Table 4. Mold Temperature and Measured Gear Dimensions (inches) Material Mold Temp (F) Diametral Pitch Outside Diameter Root Diameter Pitch Diameter Tooth Thickness Base Circle Diameter K-1000 D 180 23.9440 1.1666 0.9731 1.0859 0.0637 1.0204 KL-4040 D 180 23.8340 1.1719 0.9792 1.0909 0.0644 1.0251 K-1000 180 23.9060 1.1663 0.9734 1.0876 0.0631 1.0220 KL-4410 180 23.8700 1.1692 0.9761 1.0892 0.0633 1.0236 KL-4040 180 23.8760 1.1699 0.9777 1.0890 0.0642 1.0233 KL-4540 180 23.8680 1.1694 0.9775 1.0893 0.0638 1.0236 Lubriloy K 180 23.8630 1.1688 0.9760 1.0896 0.0643 1.0238 Lubriloy KL 180 23.8820 1.1684 0.9758 1.0887 0.0636 1.0230 R-1000 180 23.7320 1.1775 0.9845 1.0956 0.0646 1.0295 RL-4030 180 23.8890 1.1701 0.9806 1.0884 0.0646 1.0227 Lubriloy RW 180 23.7820 1.1749 0.9802 1.0933 0.0645 1.0273 RA-1002 225 23.7440 1.1756 0.9807 1.0950 0.0636 1.0290 RAL-4022 225 23.6950 1.1779 0.9837 1.0973 0.0638 1.0311 RF-1006 225 23.3990 1.1915 0.9951 1.1112 0.0635 1.0442 RFL-4036 225 23.4170 1.1901 0.9934 1.1103 0.0632 1.0434 D-1000 100 23.2980 1.1978 1.0020 1.1160 0.0647 1.0487 DL-4030 100 23.3240 1.1965 0.9999 1.1147 0.0648 1.0475 Lubriloy D-EP 100 23.2940 1.1983 1.0015 1.1162 0.0649 1.0489 DF-1006 150 23.2570 1.2001 1.0037 1.1176 0.0646 1.0505 DFL-4036 150 23.2650 1.2012 1.0046 1.1176 0.0650 1.0502 Downloaded from SAE International by University of Michigan, Wednesday, October 29, 2014 6 ASTM values on 0.125" thick parts Gear Values on 0.150" thick parts Table 5. Typical ASTM and Measured Mold Shrinkage Values (in/in) Material ASTM Flow ASTM Transverse Gear Outside Diameter Gear Root Diameter Gear Tooth Thickness Gear Tooth Height Gear Base Circle Diameter K-1000 D 0.0210 0.0210 0.0324 0.0342 0.0202 0.0231 0.0336 KL-4040 D 0.0190 0.0210 0.0280 0.0282 0.0088 0.0270 0.0291 K-1000 0.0220 0.0180 0.0327 0.0340 0.0294 0.0263 0.0320 KL-4410 0.0220 0.0180 0.0302 0.0312 0.0261 0.0254 0.0306 KL-4040 0.0190 0.0210 0.0297 0.0297 0.0126 0.0298 0.0308 KL-4540 0.0180 0.0200 0.0301 0.0299 0.0189 0.0309 0.0305 Lubriloy K 0.0220 0.0210 0.0306 0.0313 0.0108 0.0267 0.0303 Lubriloy KL 0.0220 0.0210 0.0309 0.0316 0.0215 0.0276 0.0311 R-1000 0.0180 0.0150 0.0234 0.0229 0.0057 0.0261 0.0250 RL-4030 0.0150 0.0130 0.0296 0.0268 0.0066 0.0438 0.0314 Lubriloy RW 0.0190 0.0250 0.0255 0.0272 0.0078 0.0171 0.0270 RA-1002 0.0010 0.0018 0.0249 0.0266 0.0211 0.0164 0.0254 RAL-4022 0.0010 0.0011 0.0230 0.0237 0.0186 0.0197 0.0234 RF-1006 0.0040 0.0070 0.0118 0.0124 0.0231 0.0086 0.0111 RFL-4036 0.0030 0.0050 0.0129 0.0141 0.0281 0.0070 0.0118 D-1000 0.0080 0.0070 0.0066 0.0055 0.0043 0.0017 0.0068 DL-4030 0.0050 0.0070 0.0076 0.0076 0.0040 0.0076 0.0079 Lubriloy D-EP 0.0090 0.0070 0.0061 0.0060 0.0015 0.0067 0.0066 DF-1006 0.0010 0.0020 0.0046 0.0039 0.0071 0.0084 0.0051 DFL-4036 0.0024 0.0038 0.0038 0.0030 0.0002 0.0078 0.0054 Downloaded from SAE International by University of Michigan, Wednesday, October 29, 2014 7 Table 6. Difference in Measured Gear Dimensions from Unlubricated Reference Materials (inches) Material Outside Diameter Root Diameter Tooth Thickness Tooth Height Base Circle Diameter K-1000 D Reference KL-4040 D +0.0053 +0.0061 +0.0050 +0.0007 +0.0047 K-1000 Reference KL-4410 +0.0030 +0.0028 +0.0016 +0.0002 +0.0015 KL-4040 +0.0036 +0.0043 +0.0014 +0.0011 +0.0013 KL-4540 +0.0032 +0.0041 +0.0017 +0.0007 +0.0016 Lubriloy K +0.0026 +0.0026 +0.0020 +0.0012 +0.0018 Lubriloy KL +0.0021 +0.0024 +0.0011 +0.0005 +0.0010 R-1000 Reference RL-4030 -0.0074 -0.0039 -0.0072 -0.0001 -0.0068 Lubriloy RW -0.0025 -0.0043 -0.0023 -0.0001 -0.0022 RA-1002 -0.0019 -0.0038 -0.0006 -0.0010 -0.0005 RAL-4022 +0.0005 -0.0008 +0.0017 -0.0008 +0.0016 RF-1006 Reference RFL-4036 -0.0014 -0.0017 -0.0009 -0.0003 -0.0008 D-1000 Reference DL-4030 -0.0013 -0.0021 -0.0012 0 -0.0012 Lubriloy D-EP +0.0005 -0.0004 +0.0002 +0.0002 +0.0002 DF-1006 Reference DFL-4036 +0.0010 +0.0009 -0.0004 +0.0005 -0.0003 Downloaded from SAE International by University of Michigan, Wednesday, October 29, 2014