MOSCOW (MRC) -- German specialty chemicals company Lanxess, the world’s largest synthetic rubber supplier, and EconCore N.V. are joining forces to develop new thermoplastic sandwich materials for lightweight construction, as per the company's press release.
The objective of the collaboration is to fabricate honeycomb cores from Durethan polyamides with the help of an automated, continuous process patented by EconCore. In addition, Tepex continuous fiber-reinforced thermoplastic composites from Lanxess subsidiary Bond-Laminates are to be combined with the new polyamide honeycomb cores to produce high-performance composites.
Polyamide honeycomb cores, and the sandwich composites in which they are incorporated, open up entirely new possibilities in lightweight construction, for instance of high load-bearing structural automotive parts. This applies in particular to composites with Tepex facings.
"With EconCore and its key technology for the production of lightweight honeycomb cores, we have found a partner who gives us and our customers access to a key method of lightweight construction," explained Hartwig Meier, head of Product and Applications Development in the Lanxess High Performance Materials business unit.
"As a leading global supplier of lightweight construction materials and the associated engineering know-how, Lanxess offers us the great opportunity to develop new mass production applications for our innovative ThermHex honeycomb core technology," said Jochen Pflug, CEO of EconCore N.V., based in Leuven, Belgium, which operates a German production location, ThermHex Waben GmbH, in Halle (Saale).
As MRC informed previously, in March 2014, Lanxess and Korean Hankook Tire signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to co-develop synthetic rubber technologies for high-performance tire. Under the agreement, the two companies will jointly study the development of new high-performance synthetic rubber grades and applications that increase the performance of tires from early stages of product development.
EconCore is the market leader in technologies for economic honeycomb sandwich production. EconCore’s ThermHex technology allows producing honeycomb cores and sandwich panels in a fast, continuous, in-line process. Due to its high efficiency ThermHex technology is applied typically in mass market applications allowing reductions of product’s cost and weight and consequently reductions of CO2 emissions.
Lanxess is a leading specialty chemicals company with sales of EUR 8.3 billion in 2013 and roughly 17,300 employees in 31 countries. The company is currently represented at 52 production sites worldwide. The core business of Lanxess is the development, manufacturing and marketing of plastics, rubber, intermediates and specialty chemicals.
MRC