Inserts

There are two types of inserts, mold inserts and part inserts.

Both of these inserts are modeled similarly.

Mold inserts

Mold inserts are made of metal and are attached to the mold. They are used to create a cavity in the part.

• Mold inserts can be created with a Midplane, Dual Domain or 3D mesh.
• Modeling the mold insert as a volume improves the accuracy of the heat transfer calculations. When you assign a mold material to elements instead of modeling the insert, a default small thickness is used for the insert material, which may be less accurate. This approach may be used when investigating mold design, but for more precise results you should model the insert as a volume.

Part inserts

Part inserts are components that are placed into the mold before the injection phase and ejected with the part. They can be made from metal or a thermoplastic material. It is assumed there is a new part insert for each shot.

• A part insert can be modeled with a Midplane mesh if the part insert is not required to be a solid model.
• The part insert is modeled separately from the plastic part when using a 3D mesh or Dual Domain mesh.

Consideration of inserts in Midplane, Dual Domain, and 3D analyses

The following table list the types of inserts that are considered by Midplane, Dual Domain, and 3D analyses where applicable.

Inserts considered in Midplane analyses

	Fill+Pack	Cool BEM	Warp
Part insert
Mold insert	Not applicable		Not applicable
In-Mold label	Not available		Not applicable 1
Core		Not applicable 2	Not applicable

Inserts considered in Dual Domain analyses

	Fill+Pack	Cool BEM	Cool FEM	Warp
Part insert		Not considered		Not applicable
Mold insert	Not applicable			Not applicable
In-Mold label	Not available			Not applicable 1
Core		Not applicable 2		Not applicable

Inserts considered in 3D analyses

	Fill+Pack	Cool BEM	Cool FEM	Warp
Part insert
Mold insert				Not applicable
In-Mold label				Not applicable 1
Core		3		Not applicable

1	In-Mold labels do not have a significant effect on warpage.
2	A core is considered as a mold element and included in the mold cool analysis.
3	The core temperature is calculated when the Calculate internal mold temperature option is enabled in the Cool 3D solver parameters. This calculation uses default mold steel material properties unless another material was defined for the core.