Design of a Plastic Handle for Metal Container

Khoo, Yoke Ling (2020) Design of a Plastic Handle for Metal Container. Final Year Project (Bachelor), Tunku Abdul Rahman University College.

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Abstract

The rectangular oil tin is manufactured in Kian Joo Can Factory Berhad (KJFC) while the handle of the rectangular tin is currently supplied by other company. KJFC is planning to selfmanufacture the plastic handle and redesign the plastic handle to optimize material usage. On the other hand, option to change the handle material with similar or better material properties but of course lower cost are to be evaluated. Hence, the objectives of this industry project was to reduce the weight of handle and evaluate alternative better material with lower cost and saving for the material usage and the material cost will be translated into profit for the company. In this project, research on the plastic handle such as types of handle design, mechanical properties of various type of plastic, ergonomic handle design, guidelines of handle design and injection moulding for plastics. The study of patents for similar product has been carried out in literature review to optimize the design of plastic handle. The design input of the handle including actual product drawing, product sample and material properties were provided, weight of handle material and requirements specimen of the pull test are given. With the input parameter are given and used for static structural analysis on handle. Static structural analysis is performed on the current handle made of high density polyethylene with material code HD5740 by using ANSYS Workbench. The FEA handle model was validated with the experimental model. To improve the handle design, topology optimization in ANSYS Workbench was used to eliminate the material of handle that have minimum stress region, reduced desired weight and failure prediction of model. Design Claim in ANSYS Workbench and SolidWorks were used to redesign the handle based on the topology optimization results obtained. Five proposed handle designs were developed and performed under static structural analysis. Comparison among the proposed handle designs were made. Two finalized handle designs were chosen based on their total deformation and von-Mises stress on static structural analysis and safety factor. The finalized handle designs have successfully achieved by reducing 30% of actual weight of plastic handle. Alternative type of materials similarly high density polyethylene with material code HI5748 with lower cost was compared with the actual material by performing finite element analysis (FEA) on handle model. Although HI5748 (alternative material) has lower tensile yield strength and tensile ultimate strength (UTS) compared to HD5740UA (actual material), it is comparable with 26.35% difference in tensile yield strength and 10.46% difference in UTS. Thus, it is still acceptable without fracture under maximum load applied. The FEA analysis was performed on the new handle designs with new material by using ANSYS and the results show the new material with new designs were in the range of 19.026mm to 19.728mm for final results of maximum total deformation and in the range of 20.805MPa to 21.156MPa for final results of maximum von- Mises stress.