From the Sector

The AVK – Industrievereinigung Verstärkte Kunststoffe e.V. – has once again announced the winners of its prestigious Innovation Awards. Decided by an expert jury, the awards recognise and honour sustainable innovations in three categories: “Innovative Products/Applications”, “Innovative Processes” and “Research and Science”.

Overview of all the winners in the three categories:

Category “Innovative Products/Applications”
1st Place: “Directly-cooled electric motor with integral lightweight housing made of fibre reinforced polymers - DEmiL” – developed by the Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology ICT, Pfinztal, Germany, in partnership with the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and Sumitomo Bakelite Co., Ltd.*

2nd Place: “Intrinsically Reprocessable, Repairable and Recyclable (3R) thermoset composites for more Competitive and Sustainable Industries” – developed by cidetec, Donostia-San Sebastian, Spain*

3rd Place: “Fireproof composite metal hybrid structure – LEO® fire protection sandwich with integrated Hyconnect steel-glass hybrid connector” – developed by SAERTEX GmbH & Co. KG and Hyconnect GmbH.*

Category “Innovative Processes”
1st Place: “Robotised Injection Moulding (ROBIN)” – developed by Robin, Dresden with the Institute for Lightweight Engineering and Polymer Technology at the TU Dresden*

2nd Place: “Omega stringer from the roll” – developed by the German Aerospace Center, Braunschweig*

3rd Place: “Hybrid die-casting – manufacturing of intrinsic CFRP-aluminium composite structures in aluminium high-pressure die-casting” – developed by Faserinstitut Bremen e. V. with Fraunhofer IFAM, Bremen*

Category “Research and Science”:
1st Place: “New high-temperature resistant UP resins and toughening agents” – developed by Münster University of Applied Sciences with BASF SE Global New Business Development, Leibniz Institute for Polymer Research e. V., Saertex multicom GmbH*

2nd Place: “Scientific basis for the industrial application of the thermoplastic resin transfer moulding (T-RTM) process” – developed by Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology ICT, Pfinztal*

3rd Place: “The material- and energy-efficient production of turbine struts by the integrative combination of thermoset fibre reinforced materials” – developed by the Institute of Polymer Technology, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg with the German Aerospace Center, Gubesch Group, Schmidt WFT, Siebenwurst, Raschig.

Award ceremony on the Internet for the first time
For the first time, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the award ceremony took place as an online event on 12 November 2020. Many of the award winners’ innovations will be presented again in this year’s AVK Innovation Award brochure. This will be available online: https://www.avk-tv.de/innovationaward.php

 

*Please see attached document for more information.

 

• Flexographic printing press includes award-winning SteadyPrint anti-bounce technology

Paper Converting Machine Company (PCMC), part of Barry-Wehmiller, has announced the sale of a second Fusion C printing press to Legacy Flexo Corp. in Green Bay. “We are excited to be purchasing a second Fusion C flexographic press,” said Dan Aberly, Operations and Sales, Legacy Flexo. “We’ve experienced a lot of success with our first Fusion C, which has allowed us to offer our customers more efficient runs. The fact that PCMC has been a true partner with us, providing exceptional quality and service, and is local to us were also deciding factors.”

The Fusion C has a smaller footprint with fewer parts, but incorporates many fast make-ready and waste-saving features, including the innovative SteadyPrint technology. Winner of the 2019 FTA Technical Innovation Award, SteadyPrint significantly reduces the effects of bounce when printing graphics with hard edges due to its bearing arrangement, which is coupled with an algorithm utilizing noise-canceling technology. With patents pending on all features, SteadyPrint is currently the only product on the market using this kind of technology to eliminate disturbances and provide real-time monitoring.

JEC ASIA 2019 REFLECTED THE DYNAMISM OF THE COMPOSITES INDUSTRY IN ASIA PACIFIC

JEC ASIA 2019 KEY FIGURES

• 6,600+ professional visits
• 200+ exhibiting companies from 49 countries
• 3 conference sessions and composite tours
• 40+ International speakers
• 550 business meetings
• 40+ innovative parts in the Planet
• 10 Innovation awards
• 3 startups rewarded

After three days of demonstrating the bright future ahead of composites, JEC Asia 2019 welcomed more than 200 exhibitors showcasing the latest innovations to more than 6,600 attendees from 49 countries in Seoul. From global brands to visionary startups, these companies set the composite world abuzz with the promise of innovation, knowledge, and networking.

Once again, JEC Asia gathered a significant number of academic researchers and institutions, industrials in a spirit of innovation, to prove that the sector is rapidly growing. But this year, the Korean composites Golden Triangle has shown even more dynamism and a very strong ambition to become a leading country in composites.

JEC Asia 2019 will open its doors in six days within a very positive and dynamic environment for the Composites industry. The South Korean government has decided to develop a whole Composites ecosystem. That goal will be achieved thanks to three strategic pillars: increasing R&D investment in the composites sector for equipment and machines; diversifying its materials and intermediate product providers; reinforcing excellence in research and development with major academic institutions such as Hanyang University and UNIST. Therefore, JEC Asia is a must-attend event for foreign companies to meet with this whole ecosystem.

More than 200 companies from 49 countries will attend this new edition for three days of Composites Innovation, Business, and Networking. For its 12th edition, JEC Asia 2019 will gather companies from the entire composites value chain in Asia Pacific and specifically from South Korea. They will present their latest capabilities and innovations to the composite’s community and the strategic end-user’s market. Companies like Toray Advanced Materials, Hyosung, Kolon, Hanwha Q Cells & Advanced Materials, Hankuk Carbon, Arkema Korea, and Samyang Corp. are amongst the participants, to name a few.

“The Composites Industry in Asia Pacific is dynamic and largely contributes to the global growth of the Industry. JEC Asia is the major composites platform in the region, where the full value chain gathers from raw material producers, intermediate and final processors. It also encompasses the downstream of the value chain, the original equipment manufacturers (OEM), and end-users. For its 12th edition, JEC Asia will showcase numerous features: an extensive conference program that includes the ICF (International Carbon Festival co-organized with the KCTech), composites tours and the coveted JEC Innovation Awards etc. All these have been crafted to provide the composites industry with targeted networking opportunities and an unrivaled event to develop and share knowledge on composite materials”, says Christian STRASSBURGER, Events Director APAC.

Lectra has been awarded by a jury of experts the Texprocess Innovation Award 2019 in the New Process category for its latest ground-breaking offer, Fashion On Demand by Lectra.

Fashion On Demand by Lectra automates the entire personalization process, from order reception and product development to the final cutting stages. Resulting from a four-year research-and-development process, the digital solution for on-demand production was developed based on Industry 4.0 principles.

"We are very proud to receive this prestigious award at Texprocess, the biggest international event for all fashion players. Fashion On Demand by Lectra allows companies to produce personalized clothing at the same speed as ready-to-wear and avoid overstocking by producing in precise quantities,” states Holger Max-Lang, President, Northern & Eastern Europe, Middle East, Lectra.

Fashion On Demand by Lectra is available in the form of two packages, one dedicated to made to measure, with pattern adjustments, and the other to customization, with product characteristic alterations. This turnkey solution automates on-demand production right from order reception to production development stages and the cutting room. Companies can define their desired product personalization criteria for each item depending on the package, and launch production processes right from the get-go, without interfering with their standard workflows.

"This innovative cloud-based platform solution ensures efficient made-to-measure and customization production processes and facilitates nearshoring for companies that offer individualized products. This technology is up and running and can be used by the fashion industry on a plug-and-play basis," say the jury experts. “Since 2011, the Texprocess Innovation Award has been honoring remarkable achievements and new developments in the Texprocess product range under two categories: new technology and new process. The winners are selected based on criteria such as degree of innovation, choice of materials and environmental sustainability."

On April 11^th, 2019, the 9 Partner Institutes of the AZL opened the doors of their machinery halls and research labs to provide an extensive and on-site insight into the research and development capaci-ties in the field of lightweight production and composites at the RWTH Aachen Campus. As a special highlight of this year, the AZL presented the "iComposite 4.0" self-optimizing process chain: fiber-spraying - dry fiber placement - adaptive RTM as well as AZL´s new prototype machine development "Ultra-Fast Consolidator Machine" for highly productive and flexible processing of thermoplastic tapes with in-situ consolidation (winner of the JEC World Innovation Award 2019).

More than 100 Participants from external companies as well as from the AZL Network had the possibility to experience updates on the latest lightweight production technologies and equipment, get to know the bene-fital infrastructure on the Campus and network with internationally represented companies of the entire light-weight value chain researches by taking part in five guided tours to the lightweight institutes.

The AZL brought together content in the field of textiles (ITA), plastics and composite materials (IKV), pro-duction technology (WZL, IPT, ILT, and ISF), quality assurance and production-integrated measurement technology (WZL), lightweight design (SLA), automotive production (IKA) as well as multi-material systems and process integration (AZL).

Once a year at the Open Day, the AZL offers an exclusive and widespread unique insight into the R&D capacities of the institutes in the field of lightweight and composite technologies on the campus of RWTH Aachen University. Within walking distance, researchers and students from 9 institutes are working on the latest technologies for the cost-efficient development and production of lightweight components within one of the largest research landscapes in Europe. The research, closely involving industrial companies, covers the entire value chain from fiber production, materials and processing technology to quality assurance and com-ponent testing.

This year, AZL won the JEC AWARD 2019 for the development of the new machine system “Ultra-Fast Consolidator Machine”. This innovative machine system is a result of an 18-months AZL Joint Partner Project, conducted in 2017-2018 by the research partners AZL Aachen and Fraunhofer IPT Aachen, in cooperation with industrial partner companies including Conbility, Covestro, Engel, Evonik, Fagor Arrasate, Faurecia SE, Laserline, Mitsui Chemicals, Mubea Carbo Tech, Philips Photonics, SSDT and Toyota (in alphabetical order).

The new UItra-Fast Consolidator Machine offers both high flexibility and mass production of tailored thermoplastic laminates with reduced scrap. Fully consolidated multi-layer laminates with different fiber directions and minimized scrap (tailored blanks) can be produced in cycle times below 5 seconds with this new scalable machine setup. This individualized mass production is accomplished by a combination of laser-assisted tape placement with in-situ consolidation and a piece-flow principle, which is state of the art in the printing industry but has not been used in such a way within composite production. The achievable productivity is enhanced to more than 500 kg/hour by this piece-flow principle with carriers moved through multiple application stations which are equipped with multiple tape placement applicators. The new machine is scalable: multiple application stations can be added, e.g. for each layer one station for mass production or for each fiber direction one station with a carrier-conveyor carousel: here the carriers are moved multiple times through the application stations.

The system will be commercialized by some of the industrial partners in 2019. The real machine setup has been presented at the AZL booth during the JEC Exhibition in Paris 2019.

The follow-up project has just started and is still open to join for industrial partners. This follow-up project comprises a further upscale of the machine system as well as a preparation of the commercialization by long-term durability tests and further process optimizations using different tape materials.

• Hexcel’s Composite Innovations For Aerospace, Automotive, Energy And Marine Applications At JEC World 2019 Hall 5 - Stand J41

STAMFORD, Conn. – At this year’s JEC World taking place in Paris on March 12-14, Hexcel will promote a wide range of composite innovations for customer applications in aerospace, automotive, energy and marine markets.

Aerospace Innovations

Hexcel’s HiTape® and HiMax™ dry carbon reinforcements were developed to complement a new generation of HiFlow™ resin systems, producing high quality aerospace structures using the resin infusion process. HiTape® was developed for the automated lay-up of preforms and HiMax™ is a range of optimized non-crimp fabrics (NCF). Both products incorporate a toughening veil to enhance mechanical properties, meeting the structural requirements for aerospace parts.

Visitors to JEC will see an Integrated Wing Panel demonstrator and an I-beam, both made with HiTape® reinforcements, and an Opticoms rib made with HiMax™ NCF. The Opticoms rib and I Beam were both manufactured using C-RTM (Compression Resin Transfer Molding). They were injected with Hexcel’s RTM6 resin in a process taking less than 5 minutes. The total manufacturing cycle for both parts was just 4.5 hours.

Also among the Aerospace exhibits, Hexcel will display a composite petal for a satellite antenna, manufactured by Thales Alenia Space Italia. The petal is part of a set of 24 deployable structural elements that form the large area reflector assembly used on board Low Earth Orbit (LEO) observation satellites. Thales Alenia Space Italia selected Hexcel’s HexPly® M18 prepreg for this application, acknowledging the superior mechanical and outgassing properties provided.

Another Hexcel prepreg application on show is a “zero” frame, manufactured by Aerofonctions for the engine area of Daher’s TBM 910/930 single-engine turboprop aircraft. Hexcel’s HexPly® M56 prepreg was selected by Daher for the “zero” frame – a product developed for Out of Autoclave applications that provides the same high quality and performance as autoclave-cured prepregs, from a simple vacuum bag cure in an oven.

With 50 years of experience behind its comprehensive range of high-strength, high-strain PAN-based carbon fibers, Hexcel continues to innovate, and is introducing two new fibers to its portfolio. HexTow® HM50 combines high modulus and high tensile strength, making it ideal for commercial and defense aircraft and engines. HexTow® 85 was developed specifically to replace rayon-based carbon fiber for ablative applications.

HexTow® carbon fiber holds the most qualified carbon fiber positions on aerospace programs in the industry and is the best unsized fiber available on the market. It provides excellent bonding interfacial properties with thermoplastic matrices and is the best-performing fiber for 3D printing applications.

Additive manufacturing is another area of expertise for Hexcel, using PEKK ultra-high performance polymers and HexAM™ technology to manufacture carbon-reinforced 3D printed parts. This
innovative process provides a weight-saving solution for intricate parts in highly demanding aerospace, satellite and defense applications. HexPEKK™ structures offer significant weight, cost and time-to-market reductions, replacing traditional cast or machined metallic parts with a new technology.

Hexcel is well known for its range of weight-saving, stiffness-enhancing honeycombs and the company adds value by providing a range of engineered core solutions to customers from facilities in the USA, Belgium and the newly opened Casablanca plant in Morocco. Hexcel’s engineered core capabilities enable highly contoured parts with precision profiling to be produced to exacting customer specifications. An example of such a part will be on display at JEC. Made from Aluminum FlexCore®, the part is CNC machined on both sides, and formed and stabilized with both peel ply and flyaway layers of stabilization. Aircraft engines benefit from a number of Hexcel core technologies including HexShield™ honeycomb that provides high temperature resistance in aircraft engine nacelles. By inserting a thermally resistant material into honeycomb cells, Hexcel provides a core product with unique heat-shielding capabilities that allows for the potential re-use of material after a fire event.

Hexcel’s Acousti-Cap® broadband noise-reducing honeycomb significantly improves acoustic absorption in aircraft engine nacelles. The acoustic treatment may be positioned at a consistent depth and resistance within the core, or can be placed in a pattern of varying depths and/or resistances (Multi-Degrees of Freedom and 3 Degrees Of Freedom), offering an acoustic liner that is precisely tuned to the engine operating conditions. These technologies have been tested at NASA on a full engine test rig and meet all 16 design conditions without trade-offs.

HexBond™ – the new name in Adhesives

Hexcel’s range of high performance adhesives has expanded considerably following the company’s acquisition of Structil. The company has now decided to unite the range by marketing all of its adhesive products using HexBond™ branding. The comprehensive range of HexBond™ structural film adhesives, foaming adhesive films, paste adhesives, liquid shims, epoxy fillets and Chromium free liquid primers is suitable for a wide range of applications in combination with Hexcel’s prepreg and honeycomb products.

Automotive Innovations

Hexcel’s carbon prepreg patch technology provides an innovative way of locally stiffening and reinforcing metal parts, providing noise and vibration management functionality. HexPly® prepreg patches consist of unidirectional carbon fiber impregnated with a fast curing epoxy matrix that has self-adhesive properties, enabling it to bond to metal in a highly efficient one-step process. These key technology properties are demonstrated in an 18.5kg aluminum subframe (that is 50% lighter than steel equivalents), which was reinforced with 500 grams of HexPly® prepreg and tested by Saint Jean Industries. The part demonstrates a significant reduction in noise, vibration and harshness (NVH). Other benefits include lower production costs, energy savings, increased driver comfort, production flexibility and part count reduction. With this technology Hexcel is a finalist in the JEC Innovation Awards 2019 in the Automotive Applications category.

HexPly® prepreg patch technology was also applied to a hybrid side sill demonstrator developed with Volkswagen and Dresden University to address future crash test requirements, specifically for electric cars. Combining fiber-reinforced plastic (FRP) with metal, the hybrid construction allows for optimum performance including weight savings, enhanced safety, increased energy absorption, battery protection in a crash situation and production flexibility.

Hexcel will also display a lightweight CFRP transmission crossmember produced from Hexcel’s high performance HexMC®-i 2000 molding compound. The transmission crossmember was developed in partnership with the Institute of Polymer Product Engineering (at Linz University), Engel and Alpex. As the part connects the chassis together and supports transmission it has to be stiff and strong, resisting fatigue and corrosion. Hexcel’s HexMC®-i 2000 was selected as the best-performing molding compound on the market, curing in as little as two minutes to produce lightweight, strong and stiff parts.
To produce the transmission crossmember HexMC®-i 2000 preforms are laid up in Alpex molds and compression-molded in a v-duo press that was tailored for the application by Engel. Ribs, aluminum inserts and other functions can be molded into the part using the single-stage process, reducing component-count. Any offcuts from the preforms can be interleaved between the plies of material to provide additional reinforcement in key areas - meaning that the process generates no waste.

Other Automotive promotions on Hexcel’s stand at JEC World include a composite leaf spring manufactured by ZF using HexPly® M901 prepreg. In contrast to steel leaf springs, composite versions offer many advantages including weight savings of up to 70%, high corrosion resistance, optimized system integration and superior performance. HexPly® M901 prepreg reduces the cure cycle to below 15 minutes and provides 15% higher mechanical performance, with enhanced fatigue properties. It also operates at high temperatures, providing a Tg of up to 200°C following a post cure.

Marine Innovations

Hexcel has a comprehensive range of products aimed at racing yacht and luxury boat builders that include America’s Cup, IMOCA class and DNV GL-approved prepregs, woven reinforcements and multiaxial fabrics for hull and deck structures, masts and appendages.

At JEC World Hexcel will display an IMOCA yacht mast manufactured by Lorima using HexPly® high modulus and high strength carbon fiber prepreg from Hexcel Vert-Le-Petit. Lorima is the exclusive official supplier of masts for IMOCA 60 class racing boats.

Hexcel’s HexTow® IM8 carbon fiber has been selected as the highest performing industrial carbon fiber on the market and will be used by spar and rigging manufacturer Future Fibres to manufacture their AEROrazr solid carbon rigging for all the teams in the 36th America’s Cup.

Hexcel’s HiMax™ DPA (Dot Pattern Adhesive) reinforcements are non-crimp fabrics supplied pre-tacked, allowing multiple fabrics to be laid-up more easily in preparation for resin infusion. Providing an optimal, consistent level of adhesion, they allow a faster and more consistent resin flow, as well as eliminating the use of spray adhesive for a healthier working environment and lower risk of contamination. Simply unrolled and applied to the mold or core layer before the introduction of resin, HiMax™ DPA fabrics are widely used in boat building, where lay-up times can be reduced by up to 50%.

Wind Energy Innovations

Hexcel has developed a range of HexPly® surface finishing prepregs and semi-pregs for wind turbine blades and marine applications. Providing a tough, durable and ready-to-paint surface without using in-mold coats, these products shorten the manufacturing cycle and reduce material costs. HexPly® XF2(P) prepreg is optimized for wind blades and has a ready-to-paint surface, straight from the mold, saving at least 2 hours of takt time.

Polyspeed® pultruded carbon laminates were developed for load-carrying elements in a blade structure and are manufactured with a polyurethane matrix that provides outstanding mechanical performance in terms of stiffness and durability. The blade manufacturing process is optimized, with increased throughput. The pultruded laminates are supplied in coils as continuous cross section profiles.
HiMax™ non-crimp fabrics using E-glass, high modulus glass and carbon fibers are also available in a wide range of unidirectional, biaxial and triaxial constructions. HiMax™ fabrics have applications throughout the turbine, from the stitched carbon fiber UDs used in the main structural elements, to glass fabrics and hybrids for blade shells and nacelles. There are also specialist applications such as lightweight fabrics for heated leading edge de-icing zones.

JEC Innovation Awards celebrate the fruitful cooperation between players of the composite community. Over the past 15 years, the JEC Innovation Awards have brought in 1,800 companies worldwide. 177 companies and 433 partners have been rewarded for the excellence of their composite innovations. The JEC Innovation Awards reward composites champions, based on criteria such as partner involvement in the value chain, technicality or commercial applications of innovations.

3D PRINTING, A NEW CATEGORY IN 2019
In 2019, 30 finalists have been selected by an international jury of experts from more than a hundred applications. They compete in 10 categories, among which the new 3D printing one. "The JEC Innovation Awards program is emblematic and recognizes pioneers in composite innovation. 3D printing plays a new role in our industry. The combination of lightweight, resistant materials that allow great design freedom, with a technology that allows complex shapes, is of interest to manufacturers. Many manufacturers have started using it to print automotive parts, aircraft parts, or building walls”, analyses Franck GLOWACZ, Innovation Content Leader at JEC Group. “Due to the very high level of the nominees, the JEC Innovation Awards ceremony should be very rich! ”

Twelve companies from eight different countries will receive a JEC Innovation Award at JEC Asia 2018. Asia-Pacific is an innovative region that sets the tone for all other regions of the globe. Once again, the JEC Innovation Awards highlight how composites bring solutions considering the new challenges in terms of efficiency, sustainability and life-cycle analysis.

This year, JEC Group awards innovations in the following categories: aerospace (structural and tooling), automotive, commercial vehicles, e-mobility, marine, railway, sports & leisure, infrastructure & civil engineering, industrial equipment, sustainability and additive manufacturing.

The ceremony will take place on Thursday November 15, 2018 at the COEX Center of Seoul (South Korea). Ida DAUSSY (Seo Hye-na), will host the ceremony in front of officials, manufacturers, scientists and composites professionals.

Category: AEROSPACE – STRUCTURAL
Winner: CSIR National Aerospace Laboratories (India)

Most of the composite structures for aircraft are made of carbon-epoxy composites, which can withstand a maximum service temperature of 130°C. As a consequence, carbon-epoxy materials cannot be used in hot zones like engine vicinity areas. The Aeronautical Development Agency (ADA) and CSIR-NAL took up the challenge of developing high temperature resistant composites for use in hot zones of light combat aircraft, which would result in significant weight and cost savings, as well as a considerable reduction in the meantime between failures (MTBF) due to thermal ageing.

The first task was to choose a material system with a service temperature of about ~ 200°C. During the material selection process, it was found that BMI resins are a relatively young class of thermosetting polymers. Hence, a carbon-BMI prepreg was selected due to a number of unique features including excellent physical property retention at elevated temperatures and in wet environments.

It was realized that weight savings and performance can be maximized using co-curing technology. This results in a large reduction of fabrication cycle times, costs and weight. Co-cured structures have fewer fasteners, which results in shorter assembly cycle times and also reduces sealing issues.

A prototype engine bay door assembly was built and tested at 180°C for flight certification. The engine bay door consists of an inner skin and co-cured outer skin assembly with eight transverse stiffeners. The stiffeners were designed with ‘J’ sections. The door size was 1.5 m length, 1 m width and 0.4 m overall depth. The co-cured door was developed using autoclave moulding. Two doors were installed in prototype aircraft and successfully flown.