DSM is celebrating a decade of customer successes with its Akulon Ultraflow extra-high flow polyamide 6 in a wide range of applications. Akulon Ultraflow polyamide 6 flows up to 80 per cent faster than standard grades and enables injection moulding cycle times to be cut by up to 25 per cent all with no significant loss of mechanical properties in the finished part. Processors and users can benefit from reductions in the weight of their parts and in the energy it takes to mould them.
Thin-wall items with long flow paths and high aesthetic requirements benefit especially from Akulon Ultraflow. It provides them with better surface quality, and it creates lower moulded-in stress (which otherwise could result in warpage).
When the material was launched back in 2002, Akulon product manager Bert Havenith said he was convinced that Akulon Ultraflow provided a solution for many DSM customers. “Housings and enclosures look better in Akulon Ultraflow - and looks are more and more important to consumers,” he said. Now, with a stronger focus on energy consumption, sustainability and carbon footprints, the benefit for the processor from the ease and speed of processing, which translates into energy savings - and lower costs - has extra significance.
Today, Akulon Ultraflow is approved and used in a variety of applications, including:
• under-the-hood automotive components and assemblies (air cleaners, intake manifolds, engine covers, fans and shrouds, oil sumps),
• high-visibility automotive interior items (door handles, seat adjuster levers, ventilator lamellae, mirror brackets),
• automotive safety applications (air bag containers and such structural parts as front-end modules),
• electrical components (connectors, sensors, overmoulded electro-mechanical components, bobbins and solenoids, junction boxes, terminal blocks),
• power tool and lawn and garden enclosures and housings,
• a wide variety of sports equipment (ski bindings, inline skates),
• seat components,
• a broad range of appliance and building and construction applications.
“In these and other applications, customers have benefitted from increased productivity (cycle time reduction, lower tooling costs) and increased freedom of design (flow improvement), as well as increased quality levels (surface appearance, weldability) in the finished part,” DSM said.
Reductions in cycle times of up to 25 per cent are achieved through a combination of shorter injection- and holding pressure times, faster crystallisation speed and the option to use processing temperatures 30 to 40° C lower than with competing polyamides, which allows cooling time to be cut. The net result is higher productivity and lower system costs.
