In the manufacturing process of automobile tire, molds are very important mechanical equipment. The quality of the mold directly affects the quality of the tire. There are carved patterns or other patterns on the surface of the tire mold, and the mold is often used in a high temperature and high humidity environment, so there would be a lot of rubber or other residues left in the inner carving grooves. When these residues accumulate to a certain extent, they will affect the shape and structure of the mold and eventually result in inferior products, so it is particularly important to keep the tire mold clean.
With the continuous development of science and technology, tire mold cleaning technology is constantly upgraded. The earliest method is to soak the tire mold with high temperature alkali water, which is very useful for small molds, but not for large molds.
Later, people invented the sandblasting method, which mainly use sand and glass beads as raw materials for cleaning purpose. But all sandblasting cleaning technologies have a problem: they can damage the mold surface and reducing the service life of the mold. In recent years, chemical agent cleaning, dry ice cleaning and other technologies have emerged in the industry, but these methods are still unable to fundamentally solve the said problem in cleaning tire molds. For the sake of the industry, it is necessary to develop a more environmentally friendly, effective and cost-saving cleaning technology.
The tire mold laser cleaning technology is a process that uses utilizes the high energy, high brightness and good directivity of the laser to eliminate the adhesion between the dirty and the surface of the object, so as to remove the dirty without damaging the substrate.
Taking the 500W pulsed laser as an example, the cleaning effectiveness and efficiency are described as follows:
1. Offline cleaning: It takes 25 minutes to clean one pair of 51-inch spring air hole sleeve molds (semi-steel tire).
2. Online cleaning: It takes 60 minutes to clean two pairs of 51-inch spring air hole sleeve molds in normal cleaning cycles (semi-steel tire).
3. Cleaning effect: colloid, rust and accumulated substances can be thoroughly cleaned off, and after cleaning, the outer surface of the mold is bright, free of damage such as scratches, burning spot and color difference.
