MATERIALS | REINFORCEMENT
materials in structural applications.” Reinforced PA66 can also be used in aluminium-
Above: A smartphone fixture made of Luvotech Eco PA66- GF50-HS-BK, a compound produced by Lehvoss
Jens Kaatze, CEO of Mocom, says: “We priori- tised future-proofing this new production hall. For instance, a photovoltaic system on the roof supplies electricity autonomously, and we will utilise our process waste heat for heating. Initially, we are starting with one extruder line and equip- ment for processing carbon fibres for compound- ing, which means producing plastics for further processing. The hall is designed to accommodate additional extruder lines.” Tennessee-based Insight Polymers & Com- pounding sees ongoing growth of fibre-reinforced plastics for lightweighting in transportation, particularly in the automotive and aerospace industries. The company is developing an ultra-high viscosity, glass-fibre reinforced PET compound targeted initially for big area additive manufacturing of transportation applications. “This product is designed to meet printers’ need for thermal stability up to [approximately] 250° C and stability under thermal cycling,” says AJ Pasquale, Co-found- er and Director of Operations at Insight Polymers.
Metal replacement The latest from Celanese is Zytel XMP70G50, a PA66 reinforced with 50% short glass fibres. The company says it is ideally suited for replacing metal in electric vehicle chassis and structural compo- nents and many of the same components in vehicles with internal combustion engines. The new Zytel compound has a tensile strength of 270 MPa and a 19,000 MPa elastic modulus at 23° C (dry as moulded), with improved durability and fatigue resistance without sacrificing mechanical strength and processability.
“Because electric vehicles are heavier, additional lightweighting is needed,” says Tom Kelly, Senior Vice President of Engineered Materials at Celanese. “This new material allowed our customer to replace the metal crossbeam with a reinforced thermoplas- tic, which proves the concept of using these
28 COMPOUNDING WORLD | June 2024
PA hybrid parts, using Zytel Bonding Technology, which is coated onto the aluminium before over- moulding the plastic to create structural bonds between the materials. Kelly claims the technology is “a game-changer”. The technology has been used, for example, in a hybrid thermoplastic aluminium cooling plate for an automotive application. Another growing new automotive application for glass-filled PA66 is the use of specially formu- lated compounds to tune the level of dampening to meet the noise, vibration, and harshness (NVH) requirements inside the cabins of electric vehicles. Zytel NVH has been used in the Cadillac Lyriq motor mounts and is planned for broader use in upcoming General Motors’ EVs. The Luvotech eco product line of technical compounds from Lehmann & Voss is based on raw materials made with recycled fibre-filled compounds and includes a wide range of technical plastics, including PC/ABS, polyamides (PA), and PEEK, says Thomas Collet, Director of Marketing at the Custom- ized Polymer Materials division of Lehvoss. “The big challenge in the production of fibre- filled compounds lies in processing them as gently as possible,” explains Collet. “Fibre-reinforced com- pounds that consist of 100% recycled raw materials have, on average, about 10-20% lower technical/ mechanical performance than their equivalents in the area of virgin goods. [This is because] the average fibre length is significantly shorter than that of new material due to the ‘first component life’ and the grinding process as a preliminary stage for [compound] production. In some cases, and depending on the required material perfor- mance, it may be necessary to add a proportion of new fibres in the compounding process.” He explains that, for example, a recycled PA6 might need 35% glass fibres to be equivalent to a virgin 30% glass-fibre filled PA6. An alternative to increasing the glass fibre
reinforcement is to use a mixture of recyclate and virgin materials. Lehvoss has introduced new compounds for this purpose. Luvotech Eco+ PPS GF40 BK (REC50), for example, consists of 50% virgin material and 50% recycled material. Collet says this product achieves nearly the property levels of a fully virgin material. Lehvoss has determined carbon footprints for its
materials using international standards (DIN EN ISO 14040, 14044 and 14067). Collet says that in addition to the use of recycled material, the compounds are produced solely with green electricity from a certified energy supplier.
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