SABIC Showcasing Expansive Range of Innovative Solutions for Multiple Industries at Brazil’s Feiplastic
03/04/2017
At Feiplastic 2017 (booth D71), plastics-maker SABIC is highlighting a range of solutions for customers across various focus segments, including automotive, building & construction, appliances and consumer goods, pipe and packaging.
Manufacturers in the region are strongly familiar with SABIC for its comprehensive offering of engineering and high performance plastics. Now the petrochemical producer is focusing on increasing awareness around a new array of polymer materials from its broad and growing portfolio.
These include products from SABIC’s new octane metallocene portfolio, like SABIC® SUPEER™ (mLLDPE), SABIC® COHERE™ (polyolefin plastomer, POP) and SABIC® FORTIFY™ (polyolefin elastomer, POE) materials. These resins offer a variety of high-performance properties and are typically used for manufacturing flexible (food) packaging and wrapping materials. Each of these SABIC products are produced using NEXLENE™ technology, an advanced solution that can offer customers better performance – including excellent impact strength, enhanced toughness, superior transparency, and much more.
Additional materials come from SABIC’s vast portfolio for pipe applications – including those for infrastructure, domestic, industrial, agriculture and aquaculture. In infrastructure, for example, plastic pipes made out of SABIC’s various polyethylene and polypropylene resin grades (such as its PE80, PE100 and PP RELY™ family) offer an efficient, reliable and affordable way to distribute drinking water and reduce both the risk of contamination and illness.
“We anticipate future growth in segments like packaging and pipe, among others, especially as economies in the region gain strength,” said Abdulrahman Al-Fageeh, Executive Vice President for SABIC’s Petrochemicals business. “As our customers’ needs and demands evolve in this region, we are committed to be there as a dependable source for the expertise and materials they may require. We have long-standing relationships in this region, and we intend to grow those and build many new ones.”
Customers need to respond quickly to an ever-changing environment, from new trends in manufacturing to changing market needs, and they need suppliers to have a deep understanding of their industries, noted Al-Fageeh. Recognizing this, he said SABIC has strengthened its market-facing approach and is adding greater flexibility and agility across the organization to help accelerate the pace of innovation.
“It is critical for us to be at the forefront of technology, especially for those customers who are looking to us for highly differentiated and innovative offerings that will allow them to set new standards of performance,” said Greg Adams, Regional Vice President for SABIC in the Americas.
Today, SABIC is doing work at the front edge of trends across various segments, like automotive. An example on display at SABIC’s booth is a plastic-metal hybrid (PMH) structural reinforcement located in the rocker panel of a production vehicle. This PMH floor rocker reinforcement combines NORYL GTX™ resin (MPPE/PA) from SABIC with steel to form a very efficient energy-absorption crash box structure. This saves 1 kilogram (kg) in weight and maintains the required level of crashworthiness. The component is an industry-first use of plastic in a body-in-white (BIW) reinforcement without the use of structural adhesives or foams. Use of the NORYL GTX resin allows the part to go through the automaker’s e-coat process with the rest of the BIW. Additional opportunities across the BIW means a weight reduction of up to 8 kg vs. all-metal reinforcements.
Additional solutions featured by SABIC at Feiplastic 2017 include:
Automotive
- A front bumper optimized at a thickness of 2.5 millimeters (mm) to support an overall part weight reduction of up to 12 percent. Use of SABIC® PPc for this application provides all of the elements needed for lightweight, thin-wall bumpers: high stiffness, high impact and high flow.
- The world’s largest rear quarter window in LEXAN™ resin, a polycarbonate (PC) material, which features on a multi-purpose vehicle in China. This PC-based window is 40 percent lighter and significantly more impact resistant than one with conventional glass. LEXAN resin also makes possible design elements not possible in glass.
Building & Construction
- LEXAN sheets for solid, multiwall sheet and systems. These products offer low weight, ease of installation and energy conservation benefits for a variety of structures and applications. These sheet solutions can help save installation and energy costs, and they can contribute to LEED certification by providing natural light, optimizing energy performance and using recycled content.
- SABIC® PP material for applications like thin sheet, corrugated board and profiles. This resin offers UV and impact resistance as well as low contraction.
- GELOY™ (ASA/PC) resin, which provides a protective, weatherable capstock layer for PVC roof tiles. This material delivers weatherability, high impact and temperature resistance, flame retardancy and is SINAT 007 compliant.
Consumer Goods and Appliances
- LEXAN resin for a wide range of goods, from demanding home appliances and water bottles to helmet visors. LEXAN resin offers excellent aesthetics, paint-out due to its molded-in color capability and cost reduction through the elimination of secondary operations. For applications demanding transparency, LEXAN provides improved performance vs. PP, higher mechanical resistance and longer product life vs. PET and PP.
Packaging
- SABIC® PE/PP resins, which can help reduce packaging weight for both food and non-food applications, for example in flexible pouches. The results include improvements in pouch stiffness, sealing performance and retortability. The use of fillable pouches can offer a huge environmental advantage vs. transporting pre-filled, rigid containers.
- SABIC® PP FLOWPACT™ products are excellent candidates for thin-wall food packaging applications where a good balance of high stiffness and high flow is required. The resulting down gauging to lighter-weight rigid packaging can yield material savings of up to 9 percent, combined with lower processing temperatures and shorter cycle times.
Pipe
- Polyolefin solutions like SABIC® HDPE and SABIC® PP for pipes in industrial settings (e.g. chemical plants, mines and process industries) because of their ability to resist corrosion and abrasion and to safely transport aggressive and dangerous fluids and waste in an economical way.
- SABIC® VESTOLEN™ A RELY™ family of resins, which are widely used in geothermal pipes for transporting various fluids at low and elevated temperatures.
- A range of solutions for domestic applications (water, wastewater management, heating and cooling and sanitary systems) that deliver resistance to high temperatures and chemicals, excellent durability and long-term performance. These materials include SABIC® HDPE resins and PP copolymers and homopolymers, SABIC® PP RELY, SABIC® PP VESTOLEN P and SABIC® SPVC.
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