| Issue |
Manufacturing Rev.
Volume 2, 2015
|
|
|---|---|---|
| Article Number | 2 | |
| Number of page(s) | 7 | |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1051/mfreview/2015004 | |
| Published online | 17 March 2015 | |
Research Article
Plasma assisted nitriding for micro-texturing onto martensitic stainless steels*
1
Graduate School of Engineering, Shibaura Institute of Technology, 3-9-14 Shibaura, Minato-City, Tokyo
108-8548, Japan
2
Department of Engineering and Design, Shibaura Institute of Technology, 3-9-14 Shibaura, Minato-City, Tokyo
108-8548, Japan
3
R & D Center, Sanko-Light Industries, Co. Ltd., 6-22-10 Uekotanaka, Nakahara-City, Kawasaki
211-0053, Japan
* e-mail: taizawa@sic.shibaura-it.ac.jp
Received:
2
January
2015
Accepted:
16
February
2015
Micro-texturing method has grown up to be one of the most promising procedures to form micro-lines, micro-dots and micro-grooves onto the mold-die materials and to duplicate these micro-patterns onto metallic or polymer sheets via stamping or injection molding. This related application requires for large-area, fine micro-texturing onto the martensitic stainless steel mold-die materials. A new method other than laser-machining, micro-milling or micro-EDM is awaited for further advancement of this micro-texturing. In the present paper, a new micro-texturing method is developed on the basis of the plasma assisted nitriding to transform the two-dimensionally designed micro-patterns to the three dimensional micro-textures in the martensitic stainless steels. First, original patterns are printed onto the surface of stainless steel molds by using the dispenser or the ink-jet printer. Then, the masked mold is subjected to high density plasma nitriding; the un-masked surfaces are nitrided to have higher hardness, 1400 Hv than the matrix hardness, 200 Hv of stainless steels. This nitrided mold is further treated by sand-blasting to selectively remove the soft, masked surfaces. Finally, the micro-patterned martensitic stainless steel mold is fabricated as a tool to duplicate these micro-patterns onto the plastic materials by the injection molding.
Key words: Micro-texturing / Plasma nitriding / Martensitic stainless steel / Mask-printing / Sand-blasting / Mold-die for injection molding
Implications and influences: The present paper has contribution to provide a new manufacturing method for micro-texturing of mold-dies with much reduction of leading time. This micro-textured molds are directly used for injection molding. Micro-patterned plastic cover cases for mobile phones are fabricated.
© T. Katoh et al., Published by EDP Sciences, 2015
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
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