Composite materials affordable

We just cannot expect situations like golf clubs and tennis rackets for all consumer products because all products do not have those same built-in characteristics of the competitive edge. When we consider a car, we must be realistic and acknowledge that the car must have a price low enough for people to afford. Think back to the days of Henry Ford he made a car that could be sold for about 250, so that everyone could afford to have one. This affordability was the real beauty of his mass-production techniques. Everyone could afford to have a car, and then almost everyone did have one. In contrast, before Henry Ford, only the rich could afford an automobile. As soon as we get to the trade-off where composite materials will effectively compete in the automotive market place, we will see tremendously broader applications, but there are problems along the way. The manufacturing cost must be improved in order for those applications to ever come about. 

Probably no fiber since the advent of nylon has received the widespread publicity afforded boron. This space-age super-fiber captured the imagination of both the professional and the layman, opening the door to serious consideration of resin-matrix composite materials for structural applications previously the exclusive domain of metals. 

Similar methods have been used to prepare CdS NCs in optical quality borosilicate glasses." Nonlinear optical characterization of one composite sample with particle sizes ranging from 2.5-5.5nm yielded a range for of 10 -10 esu. Optical gain measurements of a similar material afforded a value of 33 cm at room temperature. At 11 K, maximum gain values reached 200 cm , and like the optical nonlinearities, these values were also dependent on NC concentration. ... 

Acrylic Macromonomers. Acrylic-methacrylic macromonomers prepared by catalytic chain transfer using cobalt(II) chelates afford polymer chains, each with an olefinic endgroup (18, 24). Such macromonomers can be polymerized or copolymerized to produce graft polymers that are useful in coatings, fibers, films, and composite materials applications (24). Moreover, one is able to synthesize macromonomers containing several alkylmethacrylates, alkylacrylates, and styrene (IS). 

There is no public information regarding the use of glass fiber in WPC deck boards. However, affordable glass fiber would certainly improve properties of composite materials. 

There are no data available to me on barium metaborate application in WPC materials. Though it might be considered for this purpose, its required effective level might reach 5-10%. This can be affordable only if besides its antimicrobial effect, barium metaborate would add more value to the composite material, due to its other useful properties. 

Some commercial biocides, recommended for WPCs, contain about 30% of the active ingredient and cost around 4.00 per pound. As recommended amounts of active Folpet in plastics and WPCs are between 0.25 and 0.75% (on some other, more optimistic estimates, between 0.2 and 0.3%), it takes between 0.75 and 2.3% (more optimistically, between 0.6 and 0.9%) of the commercial Folpet-based biocide to be added into the formulation. It would cost between 3 and 9 cents per pound of the final formulation (more optimistically, between 2.4 and 3.6 cents per pound of the composite). In many cases, this expense is on a high side in composite materials, because it amounts to 15-50% of all raw material cost (optimistically, 10-15%). Unless the microbial degradation problem for the composite material is really noticeable, manufacturers can hardly afford such an expense. 

Furthermore, exploitation of fundamental coordination chemistry for solid state synthesis affords a variety of metal ions with preferred coordination geometries and numerous ligand architectures for the construction of metal-organic composite materials. Such hybrid inorganic-organic materials exhibit useful physical properties with applications to optics," magnetism," transport," thermochromism," and conductance. ... 

Natural CNSL itself (from solvent extraction), rich in anacardic acid has been initially reacted in aqueous systems in concentrated basic solution with paraformaldehyde and after addition of composite material has been heated and cured, during which process some decarboxylation of the anacardic acid polymer occurred, as shown in the scheme, to afford a particle board product (ref. 283) having excellent mechanical properties and resistance to water penetration. The customary use of organic solvents was avoided in this process. 

Current research focuses on the combination of PTs with inorganic materials of high electron affinity, such as nanostructured CdSe or Ti02. Composite materials based on colloidal nanorods of CdSe and P3HT were first reported by Alivisatos to achieve a PCE of 1.7% [445]. Frechet and coworkers have synthesized an end-functionalized PT 252 bearing an aminomethyl group that can effectively disperse CdSe nanocrystals to afford intimate nanocomposites [446]. Depending on the composition of the film, solar cells based on 252 can lead to PCE of 1.6% under solar illumination. 

Microbial synthesis of ceUulosic fibres affords the opportunity of obtaining products with unique properties suitable for practical application in medicine and the electronics industry. For synthesis of modified bacterial cellulose, the Acetobacter subsp. strains have been applied. The selection of suitable polyaminosaccharide modifiers allows the production of bacterial cellulose characterised by valuable mechanical, electro-acoustic and biological properties. Practical applications of this ceUulosic composite material for manufacture of novel wound-heaUng dressings as well as diaphragms for loudspeakers have been tested. ... 

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