Can Glass Fiber Reinforced Polypropylene Composites be Recycled?

Now, end-users demand to know the recycling characteristics of the products they specify due to a worldwide environmental impact awareness. In turn, the material suppliers are aggressively evaluating the retention of product properties and the feasibility of reuse options. Today, cost effective glass fiber thermoplastic composites are growing fast in automotive applications; especially for energy management systems. AZDEL® composites are employed in bumper beam, instrument panel, knee bolster, and load floor applications; specifically, because of their excellent strength-to-weight advantage and toughness. These composites consist of polypropylene resin and glass fiber reinforcement in mat or chopped forms.

This presentation will review the properties of recycled edge trim and out-of-specification product generated in the original sheet manufacturing plant, compression molded parts outside quality specification, trim or cutouts from molded parts, and molded parts returning from their original use in the field. The effect processing methods have on glass reinforcement length and thermal stability of the matrix resin will be assessed via multi-axial impact.