Tepex helps reinforce child seat headrest

LANXESS is to use its Tepex continuous-fibre reinforced thermoplastic composite materials in the lightweight construction of structural safety components, including a child’s seat headrest.

The component is produced in a particle-foam composite injection moulding process, and is part of a transnational research project involving Germany and Poland.

Dr Klaus Vonberg, from the Tepex Automotive Group of the High Performance Materials business unit at LANXESS, said: “The insert made of Tepex can reduce the weight of the headrest by up to 30 per cent in comparison with the commercially produced component variant, and with comparably good crash performance too, as well as simplifying the production process.”

Norbert Schramm, Scientific Assistant at the Chemnitz University of Technology, said: “Not only is the new, highly integrated production more energy-efficient than the previous procedure, it also results directly in the finished component.”

“This reduces the total number of parts from six to one, which also lowers production costs in terms of logistics and the machine expenditure required. If a reinforcement based on carbon fibres is used in the composite semi-finished product and in the injection moulding material, the result is an assembly that is almost 30 per cent lighter.”