Date of Award

5-6-2024

Degree Type

Capstone Project

First Advisor

Bahram Nassersharif

Abstract

The plastic industry is one of great importance to the modern world. Many of the tangible objects we interact with everyday are made partly or entirely of plastic. At some point in the process of making these objects, plastic will be melted down and extruded through a die. The plastic objects most often thought of are created by the extrusion of plastic into a mold, however some plastic products are not molded at all. Solid lengths of plastic and plastic tubing are extruded from the machine through a die and then kept as is. US Extruders, a company that specializes in designing extruders for this purpose, has sponsored our team for the capstone design project. Our focus is their largest extruder, one that takes shreds of recycled plastic, or “fluff”, and extrudes it as solid plastic.

The main goal of this team is to redesign our sponsor’s ram stuffer for its large extruder so that it takes up less factory floor space, as well as increasing its efficiency. The ram stuffer is essentially a large piston that forces the fluff into the extrusion screw. Currently the piston sticks out about 4 feet from the machine, creating a large area of space that cannot be occupied by another machine. By decreasing the area this piston takes up, or omitting it entirely, the more units their clients can fit side by side in a given area. This new design must not hinder the output of the machine nor its ease of use.

The best design was determined through research, design analysis, and the guidance of our sponsor. Each team member did their own research, came up with their own design concepts, and compared these concepts based on the customer’s requirements and the engineering requirements determined by the team. Once the overall best design was determined, a model was created for proof of concept. Testing was then conducted to compare this design to the original, and the team’s top design outperformed the original. Lastly, using this data and testing, the team created a sheet metal prototype based on the best design from the testing portion.

Comments

Team Name: Rhody Ram Stuffers (Team 1)

Company Sponsor: US Extruders

Sponsor Representative: Thomas Sullivan

Document Reference: URI-MCE-402-001-2024

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