Glass for Special Reinforcements

Special types of glass fiber for specific processes (Chapters 4 and 5), such as sheet molding compound (SMC), pultrusion, and reinforcement of thermoplastics, is a marked trend in current development. Examples follow  

Owens Coming has also developing a structural pigmentable sheetmolding compound roving for general purpose and semi-structural applications. 

Also for SMC (and described as the next generation of reinforcement) is Roving 23C from Vetrotex. It is easily chopped with good fiber distribution, fast wet-through, wet-out, and generating low fuzz and fly. It is particularly suited to molding of automobile doors, wings, boot lids, spoilers, cross-car beams and other components. 

Flexible knitted reinforcement for complex shapes Syncoflex (fi om Syncoglas), provides a regular strength distribution across the whole surface (virtually equal values in all directions). The reinforcement has many holes allowing quick and thorough wetting out. 

For TPs, improved chopped strand glass fiber grades for reinforcement of nylon and TP polyester (PET) are from PPG Industries, in response to the increasing use of glass fiber-reinforced thermoplastic RPs, in automotive components especially. They include  

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