March 23, 2026 15:40

With 11,000 tonnes of clamping force and eight tie-bars, the duo 12000 US two-platen injection moulding machine recently delivered by Engel to a customer is a candidate to become the largest ever built, not only by the Austrian company.

As might be expected, the machine is designed to produce very large parts, with a projected area of more than 2.5m², and features a high degree of functional integration to reduce the number of parts and assembly steps.

To handle the high injection volume, which can reach as much as 65,000cm³, the press is equipped with two injection units operating in parallel, with screw diameters of up to 210mm.

In terms of dimensions, the press is 24 metres long and 8.4 metres high, and weighs 551 tonnes, to which must be added the mould’s roughly 170 tonnes. In total, almost 30 kilometres of cables were installed. Total installed power is about 2.4MW.

The eight tie-bar configuration was chosen together with the customer as the solution best suited to its specific requirements, although — Engel says — these clamping forces can also be achieved with four tie-bars.

In this project, the Austrian manufacturer drew on its experience in large-tonnage IMM and on its dedicated technology centre, where numerous trials were carried out to fine-tune the plastic part and the related moulding technology.

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