(BFM Bourse) – Saint-Gobain Mobility, a world leader in its specialty, will combine its automated 3D draping technology to manufacture composite parts with “heat & cold” molding technology to increase the production capacity of a single mold.
After a correction of 42% since its peak in early January, the Roctool action rebounded 17.09% to 4.11 euros on Wednesday at the end of the session, while the specialist in plastic (and composite) molding technologies announced a collaboration with Saint-Gobain Mobility Aerospace, the aerospace division of Saint-Gobain Mobility (the world’s leading supplier of systems for the mobility market).
Saint-Gobain Aerospace’s Bordeaux site and Roctool have joined forces to offer rapid manufacturing of composite and thermoplastic parts from 3D textile preforms, parts used for various applications in many sectors such as mobility, energy, medical, military, communications, aeronautics and maritime.
Saint-Gobain’s “automated 3D draping” technology allows components to be designed by optimizing performance and weight, providing significant time savings compared to manual draping, a tedious step. The final composite or thermoplastic part obtained with these preforms, quick to implement, reproducible and in the final shape, is then consolidated during curing with the infiltration of liquid thermosetting resins or the incorporation of thermoplastic fibers during knitting.
A greatly accelerated production
But until now, the duration (5 to 10 hours) of the conventional baking cycle has limited the production rate of 3D preform technology. A fast cooking solution was therefore also needed to truly take advantage of Saint-Gobain’s productive layering systems. It’s done thanks to the combination of the two technologies, which has multiplied by… 50 the production capacity of a single mould.
The Savoyard firm, specialist in technologies for induction heating and cooling of molds for plastics and composite materials, has developed a molding system that considerably increases the efficiency of the cooking stage (reducing its duration to between 15 and 30 minutes) to the polymerization of composite materials or the thermocompression of thermoplastic parts. Called “Heat & Cool”, this patented technology, to which Roctool gives access under license to manufacturers, allows rapid and homogeneous heating of the surface of the mold and efficient cooling through standard channels (with a fully turbulent water flow) . “The combination of these two technologies offers one of the highest manufacturing speeds in today’s high-performance industries and certainly a new window of applications for our customers who need composite or thermoplastic parts”, underlines the band.
Together, the use of the two technologies considerably improves the environmental footprint, the knitting technology producing practically no waste (30% material savings on average) and requiring no freezer to store the raw material (whereas in the conventional composite industry, prepregs are stored for 1 year at -18°celsius), while the rapid induction system saves up to 50% of Kwh compared to a conventional oven cycle (which would correspond to 50 tons of CO2 per production line, says the general manager of Saint-Gobain Aerospace, Scott Huth).
“We are convinced that OEMs and manufacturers need turnkey solutions to quickly respond to market demands. Our exclusive collaboration with Saint-Gobain for specific market segments focuses efforts on one of the key players and is another good example of the importance of combining materials technologies and transformation processes,” said Mathieu Boulanger, CEO of Roctool.
Roctool, however, did not disclose any financial details.
Guillaume Bayre – ©2022 BFM Bourse
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