I wanted to write about materials used in cars for a while, in particular about the main uses of plastic. The automotive sector is being hardly punished by the crisis, both OEMs and tiers suppliers. For example, in 2008 in Spain both the automotive and the plastic markets suffered job losses of 39.080 y 11.480 respectively (Source: La voz de Galicia, 16 February 2009).
Plastic is essential in cars today, it’s used everywhere. I invite you to have a look at your car and try to guess which parts are made in plastic, apart from the terribly obvious ones. It is not easy, if you consider that around 20% in weight of a car manufactured today is plastic. The advantages that plastic offers are low weight, low cost and ease to mass produce parts. In fact, it is thanks to plastics that our average car consumes less, simply because they make it lighter.
Plastic was first used in car interior, in the dashboard, the foam of your seats, the driving wheel, etc. Today it is more difficult to say which parts are NOT plastic. Tubes, engine covers, lights, detectors and so many more parts are not built in a variety of plastics. I’d love to write more about automotive, like innovations in pneumatics or how polypropylene got to rule the inside of our cars. For now, I leave you with an example of silent innovation – because the final users don’t notice it andit does not affect their buying decision – present all over this industry, always fascinating to me.
Natural Fibres!?
A while ago I worked in a consulting job related to the use of renewable materials as fillers or reinforcement for plastic. For example, wood particles which were considered waste before can be blended with PVC or polyolefins to produce wood plastic composites, or WPC, used in construction. Fibres, unlike wood dust, offer improvements over the polymer matrix with which they are mixed. In Europe, the most commonly used natural fibre in industrial applications as a component of plastic composites is flax. European flax production plumbeted after the drastic movement of the textile industry towards Asia and Eastern Europe countries. European flax producers that have survived offer top quality products and retain the technical know how developed for years.
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For a flax fibre to be considered top quality it needs to be long and resistant, with some suppliers treating fibres to be flame retardant. Natural fibre composites are mainly used in the automotive sector, to produce parts like internal door pannels. It replaces thermoplastics or glass fibre composites. The critical advantages flax fibre composites offer are:
- Unlike glass fibre, flax fibre is cheap and safe to handle
- Parts manufactured with flax fibre composites have similar cost than those produced only with thermoplastic
- It is safer than thermoplastic, as in case of crash it does not break down with sharp edges, protecting passengers
- Oil based material is partially replaced by a renewable and sustainable material, which is produced in Europe
The polymer and the flax are thermally bonded together, at the same time that shape is given to the part. This method is also commonly known as compression moulding. A sandwich structure is the most common configuration, where a non woven mat of flax is the ham and polypropylene is the bread slices. Tier suppliers offering this type of product include Röchling Automotive and Lear Corporation.
Consider the fact that 1 in 5 cars produced in Europe have a part made with natural fibre composite. Now, can you tell if your car has one? I bet you can’t. The changes made by automotive OEMs with regards to materials used and the impact they have on the environmen are not usually included in their marketing campaigns. Natural fibre composites have gained their place in the market thanks to their excellent price quality ratio, improvement on the mechanical performance of parts and the strong will of flax producers to survive without the textile market.
