Milan, May 5, 2015 - In virtually no other industry are the demands on the quality and versatility of surfaces as high as in the automotive industry. Customers value diversely and attractively decorated elements and individual appointments, particularly in the interior. To accommodate this wish, car makers are developing short production runs with numerous variants on the basis of high-volume base platforms. The focus now is on the efficient and cost-effective production of components for the respective vehicle class.

At the Plast Milan plastics trade show from May 5 to 9, 2015, in Milan, Bayer MaterialScience is presenting a complete material concept based on polycarbonate. Geared to future automotive design, it fulfills all specified requirements, including efficient production. To present various design variations to auto makers and direct suppliers, the company has developed a special sample kit.

"Drivers increasingly value customized, personal designs," says Ciro Piermatteo, automotive applications specialist in the Polycarbonates Business Unit at Bayer MaterialScience. This includes pleasant, atmospheric lighting, a seamless design and transparent, colored and diversely decorated surfaces. "The trend right now is black-and-white, high-gloss surfaces even on vehicle interiors, including trucks," adds Piermatteo. New on the scene are translucent plastics that have the look of frosted glass and are suitable above all for ambient lighting.

Innovative mold concept for different surface structures
At Plast Milan, the company is showing numerous variations of a decorative strip that is the latest development within this concept. The exhibits express the tremendous potential harbored by the use of Makrolon® and Bayblend® products in this application.

The concept components were created in close collaboration with Gerhardi Kunststofftechnik in Lüdenscheid, Germany. The processing specialist developed an innovative mold concept for efficiently producing a diverse range of surfaces and design variations. The comprehensive performance spectrum of modern Bayer polycarbonate materials enables a single mold frame to be used for a wide range of decorating options.

These include matte and high-gloss structures, attractive color shades with deep luster, and coated or metallized surfaces. This near-series mold can be used to render the most common surface design techniques and thus produce a wide array of variations without adding processing steps.

Components with high functionality in a single process step
Polycarbonates from Bayer MaterialScience also play a key role in the production of coated components with integrated light guides. Besides Makrolon® LED 2245 as the material for the light guide, advanced Bayblend® grades are used as the carrier material. The carrier materials are flooded directly in the mold with polyurethane coatings. The company markets coating raw materials from its Desmodur® and Desmophen® lines for this application. Perfect rendering of the mold surfaces enables structured, pebbled, high-gloss and matte surfaces to be produced simultaneously.

Fabrication using the DirectCoating method co-developed by Bayer is cost-efficient and can be completed in a single step. This method combines injection molding and reaction injection molding (RIM). "With this technology, durable, three-dimensional components with a customized appearance and haptics can be cost-effectively produced in just one manufacturing step," explains Ciro Piermatteo.

Three-dimensional design freedom with polycarbonate films
Polycarbonate films such as Makrofol® HF open up further prospects for the visual design of automotive interiors. These scratch-resistant, coated films are durable and thanks to new processing technologies can also be shaped three-dimensionally. The result is components with a customizable appearance.

One interesting variation is surfaces with daytime/nighttime designs that are a good fit with the current infotainment trend. The optical display is only visible when switched on thanks to LEDs integrated behind the film. At all other times, the driver sees only an elegant, matte-black surface. The underlying black panel technology was developed a few years ago by Bayer researchers.

About Bayer MaterialScience:
With 2014 sales of EUR 11.7 billion, Bayer MaterialScience is among the world's largest polymer companies. Business activities are focused on the manufacture of high-tech polymer materials and the development of innovative solutions for products used in many areas of daily life. The main segments served are the automotive, electrical and electronics, construction and the sports and leisure industries. At the end of 2014 Bayer MaterialScience had 30 production sites and employed approximately 14,200 people around the globe. Bayer MaterialScience is a Bayer Group company.

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