A die casting apparatus for manufacturing metal parts for automotive vehicle applications is provided. The die casting apparatus includes upper and lower dies presenting forming surfaces and a mold cavity therebetween. A replaceable insert and sub-inserts provide portions of the forming surfaces of the dies in areas most prone to wear and erosion. The replaceable inserts and sub-inserts can be removed and replaced during high volume production, without having to replace the entire die. A wear and/or heat resistant coating can be applied to the inserts and sub-inserts to further increase service life. A plurality of cooling channels can also be formed in the inserts and sub-inserts to improve cycle time and quality of the parts.

A mold preheating system includes a casting mold for obtaining a cast metal product by supplying molten metal to a cavity formed by an upper mold and a lower mold, a melting furnace provided below the lower mold, a molten metal supply path through which molten metal in the melting furnace is supplied to the cavity, and a mold preheating device configured to preheat the casting mold. A raised part that forms a product shape is formed in the upper mold, and a recessed part in which the raised part is housed is formed in the lower mold. The mold preheating device includes an upper-mold preheating burner that is disposed along an outer peripheral wall of the raised part and preheats the outer peripheral wall, and a lower-mold preheating burner that is disposed inside the recessed part and preheats a sidewall and a bottom wall of the recessed part.

A mold block includes a tool body with a contoured finished surface adapted to receive a tool insert having a forming surface for forming a bottle neck in a molding operation. The tool body defines an internal channel for heat transfer with the forming surface. At least a portion of the channel is offset generally equidistant from the finished surface to provide a path contoured for conformal cooling of the insert. The tool body has a pair of ports intersecting the channel. Several methods for forming a mold block are disclosed and include machining a contoured finished surface adapted to receive a tool insert on a tool body, forming a heat transfer channel within the tool body, and forming a pair of ports into the tool body. At least a portion of the channel is offset generally equidistant from the finished surface for conformal cooling of the insert.

In a water-communicating mechanism, provided is a bushing device capable of improving of a tight-fitting structure in which a bushing is tightly pushed into a water-communicating hole. A bushing collar is placed between the bushing and an inner wall of the water-communicating hole. When the bushing is secured to the water-communicating hole, the bushing collar is tightly fit into the water-communicating hole as a result of the wedge-shaped effect exerted between the tapered surfaces of the bushing and the bushing collar. Since the tapered surface of the bushing and the bushing collar are tightly fit, it is possible to significantly improve a heat-conductive efficiency between the bushing and the bushing collar, and reducing procedures needed to exchange casings with a good usability.

A hot runner feed system is provided for a diecasting mold, wherein the feed system has a melt manifold and feed block construction having an entry-side feed inflow opening, at least one first and one second exit-side feed outflow opening which open into a mold separation plane between a fixed mold half and a movable mold half of the diecasting mold, and a casting runner-duct structure that extends so as to branch out from the feed inflow opening to the feed outflow openings. The melt manifold and feed block construction at least in an exit-side block region that includes the two feed outflow openings in a transverse direction parallel with the mold separation plane in relation to a predefined nominal operating extent is made so as to be shortened by an expansion dimension which has been predefined as a thermal transverse expansion of this block region when heated from a room temperature range to a predefined operating temperature range that is elevated in relation to said room temperature range.

A manufacturing method for a metallic housing of an electronic device is provided. The method includes providing a die-casting mold including a male die and a female die; positioning an outer frame in a cavity of the female die, the outer frame including a plurality of latching portions protruding from an inner surface inwardly and a plurality of latching grooves, each latching portion including at least one receiving groove; assembling the male die to the female die; casting pressured molten metal-alloy into the cavity to form an inner structural member embedded in the outer frame, the inner structural member including a plurality of engaging portions respectively embedded in the plurality of receiving grooves, and a plurality of matching portions respectively embedded in the plurality of latching grooves; dissembling the male die from the female die; and removing the outer frame and the inner structural member from the female die.

Method for near-contour surface temperature control of shell-shaped molds (14) with mold rim zones (1), wherein the temperature control of the mold (14) on a near-contour temperature control surface (4) with adjacent, web-like or wall-like separated subareas (4.i) is effected from the respective rear space (3) of the mold rim zones (1) of the mold (14) and/or the respective mold rim zone (1) of the mold (14). The shell-shaped molds (14) are designed in two or more parts with the respective mold rim zones (1). Specifically, the temperature control as cooling in the form of temperature control on the temperature control surface (4) is locally different in subareas (4.i). The temperature control surface (4) is effected in accordance with the temperature ranges of convection, bubble evaporation, partial and/or stable film evaporation of the liquid cooling fluid water.

A shaping tool includes a cooling system having one or more cooling passages configured for enhanced cooling. The cooling passages provide latent heat cooling of a heated material that is in contact with a shaping surface of the tool. Cooling fluid flows along the cooling passages in a two-phase flow regime in which a portion of the cooling fluid is liquid and a portion of the cooling fluid is vapor. A two-phase portion of the cooling passage can be shaped to follow a three-dimensional contour of the shaping surface. Opposing walls of the cooling passage can be provided by passage surfaces of separately formed pieces of the tool. The latent heat cooling provided by suitably configured cooling channels extracts more heat from the material being shaped in the tool than traditional cooling systems.

In a casting step, a first member is cast by die casting. In the driving step after the casting step, a self-piercing rivet is driven into, from a second member side, an overlapping part in which the second member overlaps the first member, while heat from casting remains in the first member. As a result, the self-piercing rivet is driven into the first member in a state that the ductility is higher than that at the normal temperature. Therefore, the first member is less likely to crack during the driving step.

Disclosed herein are embodiments of rapidly solidified alloys that comprise aluminum, a rare earth element, one or more additional alloying elements, such as aluminum, and an optional additive component. The alloy embodiments exhibit a unique microstructure as compared to microstructures obtained from other alloys that are not rapidly cooled. The disclosed aluminum-rare earth element alloys also exhibit improved mechanical properties without the need for post-processing heat treatments and further do not exhibit substantial coarsening.