Integrated control platform for injection molding system

A single computer for controlling an injection molding system having (i) a plurality of injection molding devices which carry out injection molding processes and provide feedback signals, and (ii) a human machine interface having a display and at least one manual input device for inputting operator commands, said single computer comprising:

• a first input/output for receiving command signals from said human machine interface manual input device, and for providing display signals to the human machine interface display;
• a second input/output for receiving the feedback signals directly from the plurality of injection molding devices, and for providing real-time control signals directly to the plurality of injection molding devices;
• and
• a CPU for generating the real-time control signals in accordance with said feedback signals and said command signals, said CPU performing multi-masking processing of:
• (i) said command signals,
• (ii) said display signals,
• (iii) said feedback signals, and
• (iv) said control signals.

An injection molding system comprising:

• a plurality of injection molding devices for performing an injection molding operation, said plurality of injection molding devices receiving real-time control signals and outputting real-time feedback signals:
• a human machine interface having a display and at least one operator input device;
• and
• a single processor which (i) receives the real-time feedback signals from said plurality of injection molding devices and command signals from said at least one operator input device;
• (ii) multi-task processes the received signals in accordance with a plurality of predetermined injection molding control programs and display programs, (iii) outputs the real-time control signals to the plurality of injection molding devices and outputs display signals to the human machine interface display in accordance with the plurality of predetermined injection-molding control programs and display programs, and (iv) has an operating system which is capable of running commercial software.

A method of controlling an injection molding system which has (i) a plurality of injection molding devices that perform injection molding processes and provide feedback signals, and (ii) a human machine interface with a display and at least one operator input device, comprising the steps of:

• inputting to a single processor the feedback signals and signals from the operator input device;
• and
• using said single processor to control, in real-time, both:
• (i) said plurality of injection molding devices and
• (ii) said human machine interface display.

At least one storage medium for storing computer-readable data which causes a single general purpose computer to control (i) an injection molding system having a plurality of injection molding devices that perform injection molding operations and produce a plurality of feedback signals, and (ii) a human machine interface having a display and an operator input device, said computer-readable data causing the single general purpose computer to:

• receive the feedback signals and signals from the human machine interface operator input device;
• and
• perform multi-task processing to control both:
• (i) the plurality of injection molding devices and
• (ii) the human machine interface in real-time, said multi-tasking processing performing human machine interface functions in background and injection molding device functions in foreground.