Fillers commercial trends

Modification of commercial polymers to enhance their toughness has become a major new field of polymer science. The commercial success of HIPS and ABS led to the development of a whole new group of mbber-toughened plastics (1-3). Chapter 1 provides trend data for the use of polypropylene (PP) resins as cost-effective replacement of engineering polymers. With the development of tailored polypropylene copolymers (see Chap. 2) and plastomers for impact modification (see Chap. 7), composites of fillers and fibrous reinforcement can be effectively toughened to compete with polyamide type products. 

The number and variety of commercially available adhesives are now very large and continue to increase. Adhesive manufacturers are active in developing new formulations to meet a widening demand, and in modifying current formulations to meet new environmental legislation. This is reflected in the reduction or removai of known hazardous chemicals, solvents and asbestos fillers and a general trend towards water-based adhesives. 

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