APPLICATION TECHNOLOGY
Henkel invests in young engineers
For three years now, Henkel has been engaging in promoting young engineers. In addition to offering numerous training programmes, participation in the annual Formula Student contest for engineering students at the Hockenheimring has become a central component of Henkel’s commitment in this area.
T
he design competition attracts a great deal of interest internationally, with teams from colleges and universities from all over the world taking part. Competing against all other entrants, the teams have to design and build
the prototype of a new racing car from scratch, present it as a business case, and test its performance in various trials and a final race. 78 teams in the combustion category and 31 more in the electric category made it to the final round which was judged at the Hockenheimring in August. For the ‘general industry’ business of Henkel, as one of the
main sponsors, the five-day event is one of the highlights every year. Up to eight Henkel adhesives experts were available at any time to give the contestants advice or lend a helping hand – in the pits, working on the cars themselves, or at the Henkel stand. The latter was not only well-stocked with high-performance repair and maintenance products from Henkel’s Loctite and Teroson brands, but also featured workbenches and even a heating cabinet to accelerate curing of different adhesives.
Special award for best use of adhesive In order to inspire these enthusiastic students to become
even more creative, Henkel established a special award for the best use of adhesive throughout the whole contest. Submissions are judged on the attractiveness and creativity of the bonding application, the way the adhesive was selected and verified, the presentation made to the jury, and the students’ knowledge about bonding technologies. From a large number of submissions, seven teams made
it through to the final round. The award went to Bayreuth University, ahead of last year’s winner Zwickau University, with Coburg University taking third place. “Last year, the entries were already of a very high standard,”
says Rudolf Neumayer, head of application technology, industrial adhesives, Europe. “But this year, they raised the bar several notches further. This trend shows that we are definitely moving in the right direction with our educational approach.”
The changing face of car design
Techsil highlights that its RTV silicone adhesives deliver improved performance and increased productivity for demanding automotive headlamp design.
A
s designers push the boundaries of vehicle styling, and technology drives improved performance and smaller headlamps, the demands on key materials such as adhesives has increased. Techsil’s business development manager, Steve Morrow, has been working with a number of automotive manufacturers to provide solutions for design and productivity issues with vehicle headlights.
In one case an adhesive was required to bond the dissimilar substrates of the reflector and a polycarbonate lens. The
adhesive colour needed to be black to match the reflector housing and it also needed to operate in extreme high and low ambient temperatures. The versatile nature of RTV silicones allow the bonding of many different substrates; at the same time giving a long term level of elasticity that can cope with thermal expansion differentials over a wide range of operating temperatures. Another application was an electric car where there was a need for an adhesive to bond a glass lens to the ABS housing. The
silicone selected was clear and also fast-curing which enabled leak testing to be performed straight away. This helped decrease the manufacturing time by 22 hours thereby greatly improving productivity. “Constantly increasing demands on the performance of vehicle lighting means they need to be incorporated into more complex and
compact packages. In addition to bonding solutions, we offer a broad portfolio of products for lighting including LED encapsulants, thermal interface adhesives and lens materials.”
140 Fastener + Fixing Magazine • Issue 71 September 2011
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