The IBM Series

What It Does
The injection blow molding (IBM) process produces billions of plastic containers each year. Ranging in size from 1ml to 1½ liters, these containers meet exacting standards of consistent weight, volume and tolerance, and are popular around the world for a myriad of applications from medical to automotive to household use.

What it Costs
Compare an injection blow molding machine to a similarly priced extrusion blow molding machine. You'll find that injection blow molding can produce far more components per hour… without the additional complications of deflashing, trimming, regrinding and remixing of scrap. In fact, since injection blow molding does not produce a significant amount of scrap polymer, many companies use virgin materials continuously.

How it Works
The heart of the injection blow molding process is a triangular rotary table, which indexes in 120° steps. Core rods mounted on the face of the table form the inside of the hot parison (or preform) which is later blown into the finished container.

Station 1 is the preform mold. Here, molten material is injected under low pressure into the mold cavity, where it forms a parison around the core rod. At this stage, the neck section is injection molded to close tolerances. After suitable conditioning, the molds open and the parison is transferred on the rod to…

Station 2. This is where the blow molding takes place. The cavity of the mold defines the shape and finish of the container. The parison is blown with air fed internally through the core rod. As the blown plastic contacts the cold blow mold, the final configuration is produced. The mold opens and the finished bottle is transferred on the core rod to…

Station 3. Here, the bottle is stripped from the core rod for packing or filling.

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