RIM PROCESSING.

Automotive companies' demands for greater reaction injection molding automation, shorter demold times, and fewer secondary operations may be an old story. But it has taken an urgent new twist. The accelerated drive by high-performance thermoplastics for exterior panel business has put great pressure on RIM suppliers to come up with systems and equipment that meet Detroit production criteria as efficiently as thermoplastics do. Although coming from behind with technology that is both less mature and more complex than injection molding, RIM equipment is being rapidly upgraded as part of a technological regeneration that also involves faster, more productive new materials. Faster and more responsive controls are needed to track the increased delivery speeds of new-generation RIM equipment. One new approach is to adjust machine responses from in-mold instrumentation, rather than from slower-responding lance piston servos and component line flowmeters.