Optimization Design in Cooling System of Heterogeneous Calibrator for Plastic Profile Extrusion

Plastic profiles produced by extrusion die are cooled down and calibrated by calibrators, so it is very important to properly design the cooling system in calibrator for the profile quality. In this paper, considering the cooling channels´ location, size, number and the calibrator´s material distribution simultaneously, the optimization design of heterogeneous calibrator cooling system is investigated. An evolutionary optimization method is presented to treat such coupling problem of geometry and material by the concurrent design for cooling channels and material distribution of calibrator with a series of topology configurations (number of cooling channels). The changing of topological configuration is realized by channel-inserting policy based on the sensitivity analysis of objective function. For the concurrent design for cooling channels and material of calibrator with definite topology configuration, a new approach combining the interior penalty-function method with the genetic algorithm (GA) is proposed. The correctness and validity of the design method are illustrated through optimization design of SF66 profile´s calibrator.