Plastics roll into new territory

From structural members to Class A surfaces, plastics continue to find increasingly broad application in the automotive industry.

No single material proves completely satisfactory for all of the application areas on a vehicle, but plastics are gaining considerable attention as a realistic candidate for locales once considered off-limits. Simple reasons for plastics moving to new application zones highlight the ever-present drive for cost and mass reduction. But the more comprehensive agenda behind application progression underscores the innovative engineering work being done by purveyors of plastics.

Quadrant Plastic Composites, considered the world's largest glass-mat thermoplastics (GMT) producer, is preparing to enter the realm of exterior body applications via its newest product offering, SymaLITE. The underlying obstacle to using GMT for Class A surfaces is the inherent waviness “caused by the coarseness of the typical fiber reinforcements used in traditional GMT composites,” said Harri Dittmar, Manager of Market Development - Composites for Quadrant Plastic Composites AG of Switzerland.