MOSCOW (MRC) -- Wacker Chemie AG is expanding its range of services in Turkey with official opening of a technical center for construction, textile and consumer-care applications in Istanbul, as per the company's press release.
The technical facility serves as an application and test laboratory for polymeric binders and silicones needed in the region’s construction, textile, household and cosmetics industries. By broadening its local expertise in application technology and service, the Group can now offer its customers and business partners even better local support.
Technical service engineers test regional products and formulations. The new laboratory focuses on polymeric binders used in construction applications such as tile adhesives and external thermal insulation composite systems (ETICS).
This new technical center is Wacker Chemie AG’s response to Turkey’s sustained economic growth. "Our customers' rising sales volumes are being joined by higher quality and service requirements, which we are now even better able to meet with our new local test facility," said WACKER Executive Board member Auguste Willems during the opening ceremony. The region’s construction industry, in particular, is experiencing an upturn, resulting in a growing need for advice.
WACKER’s new technical center is ideally positioned for this trend. The new facility enables, for example, testing of specific properties of tile adhesives and external thermal insulation composite systems (ETICS), the two key applications for VINNAPAS dispersible polymer binders from Wacker. It has, for example, modern laboratory equipment for analyses of viscosity and air-pore content or the curing time of fresh mortars. Furthermore, it offers the possibility of testing the properties of hardened mortars as required by various standards, such as EN 12004 or EN 13499. The properties that can be tested include adhesive, flexural and compressive strengths, as well as water-vapor permeability and impact resistance. Moreover, the new center is equipped to examine products under varying climatic conditions, for instance applying ETICS adhesives at low temperatures. "The new laboratory for construction polymers represents an important contribution on our part toward expanding modern construction materials in Turkey and adjacent countries," explained Hande Bucuklar, managing director of Wacker Kimya Ticaret.
The new facility also has a laboratory for silicones used in the textile industry. It allows in-depth studies to determine the thermal and shear stability, foaming tendency, gloss and color stability, as well as the water repellency or hydrophilicity of the products on offer and of customer formulations. Different formulations can be applied and tested in the new laboratory under realistic conditions, such as padding or exhausting. In addition, the equipment enables specific tests and formulations tailored to the needs of the local cosmetic and household-care industries. The laboratory is also well equipped for developing local formulations. For example, shampoos, creams or fabric softeners that contain Wacker’s silicones can be formulated to help customers with their development projects.
As MRC informed earlier, Wacker Chemie AG is expanding its existing production plants for dispersions and dispersible polymer powders in South Korea. In early November 2017, Wacker celebrated the official start of construction on the major project during a symbolic ground-breaking ceremony. The Group is building a new spray dryer for dispersible polymer powders at its Ulsan site, which will have a total capacity of 80,000 metric tons per year. The Munich-based chemicals company is also constructing an additional reactor for dispersions based on vinyl acetate-ethylene copolymer (EVA), which are needed as the raw material for the spray dryer to produce dispersible polymer powders.
Wacker Chemie AG is a worldwide operating company in the chemical business, founded 1914. The company is controlled by the Wacker-family holding more than 50 percent of the shares. The corporation is operating more than 25 production sites in Europe, Asia, and the Americas. The product range includes silicone rubbers, polymer products like ethylene vinyl acetate redispersible polymer powder, chemical materials, polysilicon and wafers for semiconductor industry.
MRC