sustainability | Strategy Jaguar Land Rover and UK-based plastics recycler
Above: Assembly of the BMW i3 at the company’s Leipzig production plant, where it produces its plastic body panels
talc together with a rubberised PP from recycled battery cases in place of virgin polymer. This combina- tion has provided a 15% material cost saving and a 30% cycle time reduction due to the ability to reduce part wall thickness by 30%.
Right: The
latest Range Rover uses
around 34kg of
recycled plastic and the
company aims to raise that further
Electric performance German auto manufacturer BMW is continuing its development of low emission vehicles and is achieving ever greater weight reductions. The BMW i3 EV (electric vehicle) has an outer skin made almost entirely of thermoplastics (the exception is the roof panel, which is made of recycled carbon fibre reinforced plastics). BMW says that the weight of the plastics parts is around half that of sheet steel alternatives. Plastics also provide corrosion-free outer protection and require less energy to manufacture, as well as being more resistant to minor damage. The thermoplastic outer skin of the i3 is produced using 25% recycled or renewable material at BMW’s Leipzig plant in Germany. Like the front and rear aprons on BMW’s conventional models, the plastic parts for the BMW i3 are produced using one of three different thermoplastic injection moulding processes, depending on the specific component. These include standard injection moulding, as well as a twin injection moulding process where the outer skin and substructure are injection moulded and then bonded in separate, successive stages. The car maker also employs a ‘bond- ing via injection moulding process’, where the outer skin and substructure are injection moulded in parallel, then joined together by overmoulding within the same automated process.
Luxus have joined a multi-disciplined Eco-Innovation consortium to commercialise a range of lightweight and scratch resistant recycled PP compounds for Class A interior automotive trim applications (see Injection World’s March 2015 edition for more details
http://bit.ly/recyclite). The Recyclite project includes Tier One supplier International Automotive Compo- nents and German compounding machinery supplier Coperion and aims to help the European automotive industry increase its use of recycled materials to meet the requirements of the upcoming end of life and emissions regulations. The project marks the next phase in the development of the Luxus Hycolene range of high recycled content PP compounds. These are aimed at replacing talc-filled PP virgin grades in demanding interior applications. Hycolene grades use synthetic mineral reinforcing fibre to improve scratch resistance and reduce density simultaneously. Luxus has previously conducted trials with Renault-Nissan, which demonstrated that the PP compounds meet performance requirements and achieve typical weight reductions of 10-12%. Jaguar Land Rover’s contribution to the Recyclite
project covers determining the immediate requirements for the materials in terms of performance and weight reduction, as well as a wider contribution to reduced manufacturing emissions. The carmaker already uses significant amounts of recycled polymer, with the latest Range Rover model using around 34kg of recycled plastic. Although it currently only uses recycled polymer in non-visible, ‘low risk’ parts requiring basic perfor- mance, the target is to increasingly use recycled plastics in more demanding structural applications and Class A interior surfaces.
Learn more about sustainable plastics
AMI’s Sustainable Plastics 2016 conference, which takes place on 1-2 March next year in Cologne, German, will bring together brand owners, processors and materials developers to examine topics such as sustainability measurement, eco-design, life cycle analysis, recycling and reuse, and green polymer selection. Find out more at
www.amiplastics.com/events
82 COMPOUNDING WORLD | September 2015
www.compoundingworld.com
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