EXHIBITION REVIEW | PLAST 2018


Right: Trinseo over-moulded samples for peel tests


with carbon fibre. “Unlike glass, carbon fibres are not affected by the titanium dioxide in the recy- clate,” Bult said. “We can achieve almost prime quality. Econamid Ait is now part of our new basket of products for metal replacement.” The basket also includes Domamid XS, a PA66 with up to 60% glass that gives parts with very good surface finish; Domo is also working on unidirectional PA66 tapes. Turkish compounder Eurotec, which produces


predominantly compounds based on polyamides, claims business with all major automobile produc- ers and also offers compounds using recyclate sourced from textile fibre waste. The company has succeeded in producing PA6 compounds that can replace PA12 in such products as cables and fuel hoses. Eurotec has also developed compounds with high glass contents for parts that are not only warp-free, but which also have good surface finish. Parts moulded in Tecomid NG can have fatigue resistance on the same level as aluminium castings. Technical Marketing Manager Erhan Karaman


Below: Large LEDS have heat sinks moulded in a thermally conductive compound from Lati


further cited compounds containing glass micro- spheres that show close to zero breakage of the microspheres during compounding, thanks to fine-tuning of the compounding set-up and judicious choice of polymer matrix. Glass micro- spheres enable part weight reductions of up to around 20%. Lati had numerous innovations on display, including various filaments made from its materials for 3D printing, as well as an enormous LED fitted with a heat sink moulded in one of its Laticonther thermally conductive compounds. The Castor 2M light, an industrial projector from Romanian company Electromagnetica, houses two COB (Chip On Board) modules for a total power close to 70W. Its heat sink is in Laticonther 62 GR/70, a PA6 compound containing 70% graphite. Tiziano Vitali, in Lati’s techno-commercial operation, said the compound has an effective thermal conductivity well above the benchmarks of other compounds


from Lati and competitors, regardless of the orientation of the graphite flakes. At RadiciGroup, Marketing & Application Development Director Erico Spini highlighted the company’s strength in high-performance polyam- ides (including polyphthalamides) and PPS. He emphasised growing opportunities in electric vehicles, where he said growth was likely to take off in the middle of the next decade. He quoted Bloomberg data indicating that by 2025, EVs would have around 8% of the total market, but the figure is forecast to reach 24% in 2030 and 54% in 2040. Radici already has materials suitable for 400-V electrical systems, Spini said, although systems (Porsche recently announced a car with such a system) will present a much greater challenge. Trinseo was showcasing its new capabilities in


over-moulding thermoplastics with thermoplastic elastomers, now that it has Italian TPE specialist API in its stable. API has a very broad portfolio of materials for soft-touch applications. Aldo Zanetti, Manager of the Packaging and Medical BU, also highlighted the company’s expertise in bio-based compounds. He noted that one interesting possi- ble application is in coffee capsules, which are crying out to be made in materials that can be composted together with the used coffee grounds. API was part of a recently-concluded EU “Life” project called PLA4Coffee (together with three other Italian partners), aimed at demonstrating that a system for producing biodegradable coffee capsules is commercially viable. Estimates on the number of coffee capsules used


per year around the world vary quite widely from one consultant to another, but Martyna Fong, with AMI Consulting (part of the group that publishes Injection World and which runs conferences in Europe and the USA on single-serve capsules) puts the figures at close to 60 billion. Some of these are aluminium, but around 75% are plastics – polypro-


38 INJECTION WORLD | July/August 2018 www.injectionworld.com


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