Mean Absolute Error

Abstract

The increased level of demand from consumers in the narrower sector of orthopedic shoes has promoted the realization of developments the related products, aimed at people with particular pathologies. In these group stands out the insoles that must be manufactured to meet specific requirements. However, the currently employed manufacturing method brings disadvantages, hinders mass production and, in parallel, the materials used do not achieve the required maximum performance. It is known also that there are a reasonable number of pathologies associated with the foot which implies the production of specialized insoles. In this dissertation, involve the production of foams for orthopedic shoes insoles aiming to circumvent some of these problems. These resulted from a mixture of two base resins, EVA/HDPE, and using compression molding. In the first phase a reasonable amount of preselected formulations were produced and characterized. In the second phase we selected the best formulation found in the previous step and the parameters of the manufacturing process were adjusted in order to improve the produced foam properties. Simultaneously a new mold was designed, machined and tested aiming to achieve some improvements on the produced foams. Finally, a proposal for industrialization of the insoles manufacturing process was established, which faces the limitations associated with currently employed method. The tests performed during the preliminary studies showed that the produced formulation properties were below the ones of the foam used as a reference, Poron, the most problematic was the permeability to water vapor. On the second phase of the study changes in the processing of foams were implemented and the produced foam blocks were drilled. The results were in general positive conclusion is therefore that the introduction of the drilling step was a crucial step for the success of the study. Finally, a proposal was presented for the industrialization of the insoles manufacturing process. This proposal consists of the sequence of operations to be used in the production of insoles, based on the currently available technology, which hopefully will reduce the resources employed in the process