• Categories:Company news
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• Time of issue:2019-09-06
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(Summary description)The soft components of the new football ankle are made of TPE thermoplastic elastomer combined with fiber reinforced thermoplastic to form a hard protection component. In a project involving 14 partners, the German Industrial Plastics Processing Institute (IKV) demonstrated the use of injection molding to process thermoplastic-based fiber reinforced plastic (FRP). The project combines the advantages of a melt impregnation process (which can process fabric preforms) with the advantages of a thermoplastic matrix. The research team is developing a highly automated, highly integrated process that uses so-called in-situ polymerization. By converting the system to an injection molding process (in-situ injection molding), complex fiber preforms can be combined with a single unit for high-volume production directly on the injection molding machine. The display selected by the IKV research team is a football ankle. Traditional production processes for FRP products have a number of disadvantages. For example, two separate processes are still required so far, such as for nylon composite sheets: impregnation and molding. Moreover, only products with a simple structure can be molded, and the range of surface structure variation is also limited. The goal of the IKV process is to eliminate these shortcomings. Using an in-situ injection molding process, the fabric preform is impregnated with a low viscosity caprolactam monomer followed by in situ polymerization to form polyamide 6. In addition to optimizing the matrix formulation, the new process requirements include: custom fiber/styling devices, special injection molding machine technology, and innovative mold, sealing and process engineering techniques. IKV uses an ankle guard to demonstrate the effectiveness of the process. The product consists of a hard protective component made of fiber reinforced thermoplastic and a soft component made of thermoplastic elastomer (TPE). Therefore, the article has high mechanical properties, good impact resistance, light weight, and good wearing comfort. In addition, this highly integrated and innovative process enables high volume production.