Development of IoT Device for Temperature and Cavity Pressure Measurements

Abstract

This paper presents the obtained software and hardware results of developed Internet of Things (IoT) measurement device that is intended for real-time temperature and cavity pressure measurements in injection molding process. We set-up an appropriate IT-architecture for easier transportation of obtained measurement data and prepared a web-based GUI along with appropriate robust and precise miniature electronic PCB boards that can be easily adopted and used for monitoring and/or control applications in plastics processing industry. As polymer materials are not good thermal conductors, the elimination of large quantities of heat needed to solidify a part also creates major problems if rapid production needs to be maintained. Therefore, a proper IoT measurement system needs to be established that is capable to precisely measure the temperature and cavity pressure behavior during different processing stages. Furthermore, a specially constructed prototype mold was selected for testing purposes which has two cavities that are used for testing shrinkage behavior of various thermoplastic materials. The measurement results practically confirmed that the developed measurement device system fulfils the requirements for precise and robust wireless IoT based measurements of temperatures on cylinders, molds and tempering units, and cavity pressures inside the prototype mold according to Industry 4.0 requirements.