Wide range of high-quality polymer products and applications

Bayer MaterialScience, one of the world’s leading suppliers of plastics and high-quality materials, will once again be making an appearance at the chemistry trade fair Khimia in Moscow from September 3 to 7, 2007. The company will be showcasing a comprehensive portfolio of innovations and solutions for key sectors including the automotive, construction, electrical/electronics, woodworking/furniture, domestic appliance, footwear, sports and leisure industries, and many, many more. Bayer MaterialScience’s Polyurethanes, Polycarbonates, Coatings, Adhesives, Sealants and Thermoplastic Polyurethanes Business Units will be showing a number of exhibits on current developments under the “VisionWorks” banner at Stand 21D25 in Hall 2.1. The main focal point of the company’s exhibition is the “zaZen” concept car, which has been developed by Swiss automotive visionary Frank M. Rinderknecht in close cooperation with automotive experts from Bayer MaterialScience. The highlight of the car’s design is its flowing, one-piece roof dome which is made from the polycarbonate Makrolon® and has a holographic brake light integrated into its rear. However, the concept car also uses products from other business units, for example comfortable seating that incorporates the polyurethane gel Technogel®. The company hopes that these developments and others like them will provide inspiration for the cars of the future.

“However, it is just as important to us that we demonstrate our problem-solving expertise for a whole range of different industries, as well as for products and applications that are often developed in close cooperation with our customers,” explained Jörg Syrzisko, Senior Country Representative for Bayer MaterialScience in the CIS. One such example from the field of polyurethanes is the Multitec® spray system.This fluid system – with or without glass-fiber reinforcement – can be sprayed into open or closed molds to create a diverse range of shapes and sizes. This technique has proved to be extremely efficient for manufacturing molded parts. Compared to conventional manual lamination, the system’s short curing time of between three and five minutes has a very positive effect on productivity. Moreover, it dispenses with styrene and the energy-intensive post-curing process.

Materials from Bayer MaterialScience are also used widely in sports products. Applications range from raw materials for bonding soles and starting materials for the textile coating of soccer boots to thermoplastic polyurethanes that open up completely new design opportunities and offer extremely good scratch-resistant properties when used as a transparent upper material for ski boots.

When it comes to raw materials for coatings, increasing emphasis is being laid on excellent mechanical properties and a lower solvent content. For example, polyurethane coatings based on Desmodur® E XP 2605 are ideal for use as resistant coatings for wood and furniture. This raw material makes it possible to formulate coatings with solid contents of up to 40 percent.

Traditional casting methods for producing elastomer-coated rollers are stretched to the limit if very large roller cores or very thick coatings are required, for example in the mining and paper industries. In such cases, rotational coating using the polyurethane casting elastomer Baytec® and the one-pass technology developed by Bayer MaterialScience is the ideal solution. This process also has its advantages for coating smaller rollers as it is extremely cost-efficient and produces roller surfaces of a particularly high quality.

Rising energy prices mean there is no way of avoiding further reductions in the use of fossil fuels. One consequence of this development is the planned introduction of energy certificates for buildings in Germany. This move has helped boost the importance of rigid polyurethane foam because the material offers the best insulating performance available on the market in both the refrigeration chain and when used as building insulation. The material’s range of applications in the construction sector stretches from ceilings, roofs, walls and floors to perimeter insulation and passive house projects that incorporate the PURWALL® composite insulation system of Hasit Trockenmörtel GmbH & Co. KG.

Multiwall and solid sheets made from Makrolon® exhibit excellent break resistance and are extremely lightweight, which makes them ideal for applications such as grandstand roofing in sports stadiums. Having already been used in modernization work on a number of stadiums in Germany in readiness for the 2006 soccer World Cup, organizers of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing are now also using these transparent sheets in building work on the new Olympic stadiums in Tianjin and Shenyang.