What are today’s cars made of?
ABEX 2006 - Automotive Benchmarking and Exhibition

What is the difference between the French way of building cars and the German or Japanese way of doing so? Which method is best suited to meet the requirements of the respective markets? Which system shows to be the most cost-effective in practice, and which is the most assembly-friendly one? And of course: which plastics are used in which portions and in which applications? The answer to all these questions is ABEX Benchmarking: modules of comparable models are compared to each other and evaluated....read more!

And the accolade this year goes to ...
ABEX Awards granted in three categories

At ABEX 2006 the organisers presented special ABEX Awards. For each of the three car models taken apart and compared during ABEX, a total of 9 prizes were awarded to the suppliers concerned in the categories „Best Safety Solution“, „Best Cost Reduction“ and „Best Solution for Weight Reduction“. We here present the prizes for plastic components. ....read more!

Spectacular parts for spectacular cars
10th SPE Automotive Award

The Society of Plastics Engineers (SPE Central Europe)
celebrated the 10th Automotive
Division Award in Neuss, Germany, on 14th July 2006.
The awards were presented in the categories “Media & Publications” and “Parts & Components”. We, of course, focus purely on the “Parts & Components” awards. ....read more!

Full speed ahead
High-speed parts removal for pump plugs

ESP housings as safety-relevant components for a vehicle’s braking control must meet the highest demands in terms of robustness and precision. Wilden AG, Regensburg/Germany, utilizes the Heku 1700 high-speed parts-removal robot from Hekuma, Eching/Germany for an efficient production of the pump plug. ....read more!

Vehicle of the month:
Citroen C4

The purpose of this section which we feature in every edition of our magazine is to present the results of design analysis of vehicles recently launched on the automobile market. This article was produced in collaboration with Mavel, a European leader in car design analysis. The aim of this article is not to present a detailed examination of a design (which is available in “Mavel’s report”) but rather to throw light on some noteworthy aspects. ....read more!

From Change to Challenge
Engel Symposium 2006 attracts record response

“Your change – Our challenge” was the motto of this year’s Engel Symposium, a customer event traditionally organized by the Austrian manufacturer of injection moulding machines every three years. The symposium on 17th and 18th May attracted record attendance: a total 2,300 visitors from 38 countries came to Engel’s technology show at its large-capacity machine factory in St. Valentin. ....read more!

Reactive Summer
Kraus-Maffei's Sommerforum in-house show

3,500 visitors from 54 countries came to join the in-house show („Sommerforum“) of Krauss Maffei in Munich/Germany. 48% of the Sommerforum visitors came from outside Germany. The represented countries included Australia, Brazil, China, France, Hungary, India, Iran, Israel, Italy, Korea, Mexico, Netherlands, Russia, Spain, Taiwan, Turkey, UK, the USA and Balkan countries. ....read more!

Closing the Gap
Innovative fan shroud design

Typically the shroud around a car or truck’s engine fan is mounted to the vehicle body, behind a grille opening. In this configuration, a gap is required to allow for relative motion between the rigid shroud and the engine-mounted fan, which reduces airflow efficiency. By mounting a flexible shroud on the engine itself, a design by Sur-Flo Plastics & Engineering, Inc., closes the gap, benefiting both engine performance and packaging. ....read more!

New Design Required
Intake manifolds for peak pressures

Volkswagen’s TwinCharger TSI is regarded as an important step on the road to engine downsizing. Double charging and direct injection led to a new intake manifold design. This allows for the application of plastics in spite of the higher pressures. ....read more!

Plastic East and West
PA and PPA for parts under the hood

What does the Russian GAZelle have in common with the new Passat of Volkswagen and the 3, 5 and 6 series of BMW? They all include material of Ticona, Kelsterbach, Germany! Celstran and Fortron have proofed to be ideal candidates for applications under the hood. ....read more!

From bezel to casing
DuPont material application exterior and under the hood

Headlamp bezels for the new Ford Transit and a casing for a centrifugal filter are possible applications for material coming from DuPont.
A heat-stabilised nylon 66 is used for the bezels, a high performance polyamide resin comes into action for the casing. ....read more!

Colliding protection
Lower bumper stiffener developed for crash applications

During the development of motor vehicles with improved passive protection for pedestrians, Adam Opel GmbH, headquartered in Rüsselsheim, Germany, entered into a cooperative effort with BASF and created a new plastic part that is instrumental in meeting pedestrian protection requirements in the vehicles of the future. ....read more!

Read more about several products for the automotive industry
....read more!