Baseball bats, foam-filling

There are many applications of porous materials. Their ability to fill space with a minimum weight leads to their use in packaging. Lifejackets and rafts use porous materials because of their low density. Examples of their use as thermal insulators range from Styrofoam cups to heat shields for space craft. Aluminum baseball bats are filled with foam to dampen vibrations. The low elastic moduli and high elastic strains of foams lead to use as cushions and mattresses. Filters are made from porous materials. 

One of the first industrial applications of this mixing head was to fill a relatively small amount of flexible foam material in the cavity of aluminum baseball bats. 

Figure 2. Custom RIM metering and mixing machine with fixture, for the fill of aluminum baseball bats with a small amount of flexible foam.

Figure 3. Aluminum baseball bats. Cavity partially filled with flexible foam.

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