High-performance plastics – developed in kilo quantities

Plastics are everywhere we look – in supermarkets, our cars, and our children’s playrooms. To have the properties we need, plastics need additives, such as stabilizers to protect the polymers from premature failure and UV light, and flame retardants to hinder plastics from stoking flames in case of fire. Researchers are developing various additives at the Fraunhofer Institute for Structural Durability and System Reliability LBF in Darmstadt. The additives are expected to improve the material, giving it enhanced performance and greater durability. Additional additives should improve adherence to metals such as light-weight structural components.

The chemists usually work with very little additive to start with, a hundred grams at most. The researchers can establish roughly what properties these have using small, lab-sized quantities. More precise predictions cannot be made, however. This is because the plastics in which the additives were introduced on a small scale often have properties different from when they are produced in larger quantities. Scientists have therefore set up a kilo lab. They test how well the manufacturing process can be scaled up in this lab and how the new additives behave. In this way, the scientists are able to tell their customers precisely what properties the newly developed additives provide to the plastics when they are incorporated under industrial conditions.

Fraunhofer Institute for Structural Durability and System Reliability LBF
Bartningstr. 47 | 64289 Darmstadt | www.lbf.fraunhofer.de
Contact: Dr. Roland Klein | Telefon +49 6151 705-8611 | roland.klein@lbf.fraunhofer.de
Press: Anke Zeidler-Finsel | Telefon +49 6151 705-268 | anke.zeidler-finsel@lbf.fraunhofer.de

Route-specific load analysis for vehicles

Greater demands are placed on a vehicle and it consumes more fuel along a curving mountainous route or on rough, uneven road surfaces than over the same distance on a flat and well-constructed road. In addition, environmental conditions like heat, cold, and precipitation influence the operating life and dependability of vehicle components.

The Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Mathematics ITWM in Kaiserslautern, Germany, is supporting manufacturers of automobiles and utility vehicles by enabling them to incorporate these kinds of loading factors in vehicle design and development with its “Virtual Measurement Campaign” (VMC). The researchers have built up a comprehensive data base for this purpose. It provides an overview of the world-wide road network and delivers additional information about the characteristics of each specific route. If an automobile manufacturer would like to develop a new market, for instance, it can construct a sophisticated picture of the conditions in the area. The effect of the various parameters on the individual vehicle components can be analyzed using software developed by ITWM that transforms these data into mathematical algorithms.

In addition, virtual measurement campaigns can usefully supplement real vehicle road testing. They enable selective route planning and provide data in advance about the loading to be expected. This helps reduce the duration and scope of expensive field testing. VMC will be presented by researchers from April 7th to 11th at the joint Fraunhofer booth (Hall 7, Booth B.10) during the Digital Factory trade show in Hanover, Germany.

Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Mathematics ITWM
Fraunhofer-Platz 1 | 67663 Kaiserslautern | www.itwm.fraunhofer.de
Contact: Dr. Michael Speckert | Phone +49 631-31600-4565 | michael.speckert@itwm.fraunhofer.de
Press: Ilka Blauth | Phone +49 631-31600-4674 | ilka.blauth@itwm.fraunhofer.de

Nanostructures – even on curved surfaces

Say sayonara to scrubbing. Dirt slides right off surfaces – referred to as the Lotus effect. Nanostructures make it happen. In addition, they can keep surfaces from fogging up and even add color to faces on Lego figures without the use of dyes or colorants. Plastics with these kinds of structures, which are only about 100 nanometers in size, can be manufactured cost effectively in quantity using injection molding. A metallic insert serves in this case as an inverse mold. The liquid plastic is injected into it, cools, and thus takes on the prescribed shape. The only bad news: nanostructures have only been able to be produced on planar surfaces thus far. On curved parts like the heads of Lego figures, it’s game over at about 100 micrometers.

Researchers of the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Technology IPT in Aachen, Germany, want to change this through an EU Project entitled „Plast4Future“, coordinated by the Technical University of Denmark. They are developing a new lithographic process with which they can introduce any kind of nanostructure desired on the metallic form – even when it is curved. The researchers have already successfully tested their process on planar surfaces. Now they are transferring their findings to randomly shaped objects. The scientists hope the manufacturing chain could be utilized by industry in about two years.

Fraunhofer Institute for Production Technology IPT
Steinbachstraße 17 | 52074 Aachen | www.ipt.fraunhofer.de
Contact: Bernd Meiers | Phone +49 241 8904-304 | bernd.meiers@ipt.fraunhofer.de
Press: Susanne Krause | Phone +49 241 8904-180 | susanne.krause@ipt.fraunhofer.de