Nowadays, the traditional injection molding process can no longer meet the surface requirements, especially in the rapid developing fields of electronic consumer products. Mobile phones and wearable devices are what I'm talking about. These products have extremely high requirements on appearance, abrasion resistance, anti-scratch, and require long-term maintenance of vivid color.

Therefore, many countries in the world, such as Germany, the United States, Japan and South Korea, are devoted to the research and development of new materials suitable for this process, and a large number of functional films and ink materials go into service.

The technology of in-mold decoration was applied to automobiles at first. The defect rate and high cost are problems. Discoloration and peeling off after a period of time are pains in the head. Afterwards, Lokia continued improving the IMD process, which made it gradually matured and popular. After several years of development, it have appeared in small household appliances and consumer products.

Due to the many benefits of IMD, it is suitable for plastic products of 3C, home appliances, LOGO nameplates and auto parts, especially popular mobile phone casings and various instrument panels.

The in-mold decoration is a process technology that puts the printed film into the mold in different types. After injection molding, it has a printing texture. It combines product design, mold technology department and traditional post-processing technology. There are materials involved: sheet, resin and ink.

In-Mold Labeling (IML)

You know the technological process of in-mold labeling? Cutting, plane printing, ink drying and fixing, pasting protective film, punching positioning hole, thermoforming, cut peripheral shape, material injection molding.

· Cutting material

Cut the rolled film into a square block with a designed size for printing and forming processes.

· Flat printing

According to the required icons and texts, it is made into a film net. The icons and texts are printed on the cut film square block.

· Ink drying and fixing

Place the printed film in a high-temperature oven to dry it. The purpose is to fix the IML ink.

· Paste the protective film

Avoid scratching the surface of the printed film during the process of punching the positioning hole. Sometimes, it is necessary to paste a single or double layer of protective film.

· Punch positioning hole

The thermoformed positioning hole must be punched accurately. When positioning the hole in the shearing process, it must also be punched in advance.

· Thermoforming (high pressure or copper mold)

After heating the printed film, use a high pressure machine or copper mold to form it in a preheated state.

· Cut peripheral shape

Cut off the waste of the formed three-dimensional film.

· Material injection molding

Put the film that has the same three-dimensional shape as the front mold after molding on the front mold. Finish the injecting, and here is the IML finished product.

In-Mold Roller

In-Mold Roller is the technology that prints decorative patterns and functional patterns on the foil film through a high-precision printing machine. After sending the foil into a special molding mold through a high-precision foil feeding device for precise positioning, it injects plastic raw materials due to high temperature and high pressure. Transferring the pattern on the foil film to the surface of the plastic product is the technology that makes the integral molding of the decorative pattern and the plastic come true.