Consumer Electronics
Consumer Electronics Bio-Based Polymer-Alloy for Consumer Electronics Toray Industries, Inc. has been expanding the usage of polylactic acid in various products and applications in fields such as fibers, resins and films with the registered trademark ‘Ecodear’. This plant-derived PLA resin, with the addition of Toray-proprietary technology, realizes significant improvements in flame retardance, heat resistance, impact resistance and moldability. Toray considers that PLA is the next key polymer and is engaged in application development, which is driven by polymer alloy technology and nanotechnology. At K’2010 in Düsseldorf exterior parts of a photo-copier made from bio-based plastics with the highest flame retardant class (registered as UL 94 5V) were introduced for the first time at a European exhibition. One of the biggest copier producers, Canon Inc. adopted Ecodear for a lot of models so called ‘imageRUNNER ADVANCE’ and achieved a high level of flame retardant and low environmental impact by using non-halogenated flame retarder. In addition the parts made from Ecodear showed a good balance between flame retardance, mechanical strength, toughness, flowability in the molding process and an excellent surface appearance. Previously the use of bio-based plastics has been limited to auxiliary parts such as packaging materials and electric wiring in Canon Inc. Bio-based plastics was first officially used in a product in September 2009 with the release of the ‘imageRUNNER ADVANCE’ series. For this series bio-based Ecodear was used not only for auxiliary parts but also exterior parts that required flame retardance, such as buttons that customers touched directly. Canon and Toray are considering to expand the range of parts made from Ecodear to clarify and overcome any issues that arise during the development process. In particular a lot of companies are looking for the materials to decrease the environmental impact and cost. www.toray.com 30 bioplastics MAGAZINE [06/10] Vol. 5
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