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DUPONT ENGINEERING POLYMERS FOCUSES ON NEW TECHNOLOGIES FOR DEVELOPING NEW APPLICATIONS
DuPont Engineering Polymers is focusing on the new technologies most valued by its customers, including physical foaming, water and gas injection, laser welding, two-component moulding, and blow moulding, it was revealed at the business's pre-K press conference today. DuPont Engineering Polymers' European Process Supervisor, Klaus Bender, noted that the company has acquired laser transmission welding equipment to evaluate and develop Engineering Polymers in order to provide new joining process solutions for customers. Regarding physical foaming, DuPont has purchased a MuCell-capable moulding machine for its European Technical Centre. Physical foaming technology has the potential to increase injection moulding productivity, improve dimensional stability and reduce warpage at low and moderate weight reductions. Bender said: "An interesting two component moulding challenge came up for DuPont research chemists recently, when we were asked to develop special grades of Delrin acetal resin that could be used in combination with a soft material called Ponaflex from Pongs & Jahn Plastics International of Germany. Because of its excellent balance of stiffness, toughness and outstanding wear and friction properties, Delrin is used for applications like gears or conveyor belts. Making another resin stick to Delrin is as difficult as making eggs stick to a Teflon -coated frying pan! However, joint research by DuPont and Pongs & Zahn has resulted in modified grades of Delrin and modified grades of Ponaflex styrene based on thermoplastic elastomer. Typical applications for this new material combination in two-component moulding technology include fasteners and clips with integral seals." DuPont has installed customized water moulding equipment for use in new resin development and direct customer support activities. Some key advantages Regarding laser welding, Bender continued: "The challenge for our research chemists was to develop new Engineering Polymers that are transparent to the wavelength of the diode laser. In particular, parts that need to be coloured or black needed to be optimised to allow the process to work properly." DuPont chemists have succeeded in developing 'transparent coloured' or 'transparent black' resins that allow the laser transmission at the diode laser's wavelength. The welding of components with sensitive electrical and electronic components, of microstructures or joining hard-soft material combinations is made possible by this technology. To reduce prototyping development time and production cycle requirements, DuPont's European Technical Centre has invested in a range of advanced blow moulding equipment such as a state-of-the-art Fischer-Müller machine with sequential coextrusion technology and suction blow moulding capabilities, an investment of US$ 1.5 million.
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