Feasibility study of use of recycled High Density Polyethylene and multi response optimization of injection moulding parameters using combined grey relational and principal component analyses

Usability of recycled High Density Polyethylene (HDPE) as substitute for virgin HDPE is investigated. Optimization design of the injection moulding parameters for recycled HDPE products is presented. Tensile, compressive and flexural strengths are selected to evaluate the process performance and the corresponding moulding parameters are melt temperature, holding pressure, injection time, and holding time. Optimal combination of injection moulding parameters is determined using Grey relational analysis. The principal component analysis is applied to evaluate the weighting values corresponding to various performance characteristics. Tensile, compressive and flexural strengths of the recycled HDPE are found close to that of virgin HDPE. Thus, recycled HDPE is a good substitute for virgin HDPE. Optimal combination of the process parameters for the multi-performance characteristics of the recycled HDPE is the set with melt temperature at 240 °C, holding pressure at 255 N/m2, injection time at 0.6 s and holding time at 30 s.