Deflection and the Prevention of Ingress within Laminated Tooling for Pressure Die-Casting

Wrthin the context ofrapid tooling, we are currently assessing the fundamental limitations oflaminated tooling for pressure die-casting (PDC) applications. The use ofindividual laminates to form a die-cast tool presents it own problems, namely the prevention of excessive deflection that may lead to the ingress of pressurised molten aluminium between laminates. Ultimate solutions lie with bonding and clamping techniques of which work is already underway. This paper describes an initial study to establish the fundamental laminated die behaviour in extreme die-casting environments.