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The Cold Calamity continued
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November Meeting Review continued
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packed into its container, I was reminded of the times I've been able to watch a parachute rigger at work: the long tables, the careful folding, and the incredibly small, incredibly important package when finished. Think of having to design and produce a system that one, you hope will never be used, and two, if it is used, may be acting ten or more years after its construction, having sat in a freezing car, a car that perhaps was in the sun with an interior temperature of 160°F, or both. A remarkable challenge for any designer.
Obviously, that environment, and the very strict automotive cosmetic requirements, mean that the entire plastics process--design, materials, colors, moldmaking and molding--is really challenged. Autoliv, although they are a small molder in terms of the number of machines (5), is a first-class operation in terms of the quality of the product they produce, and we were very fortunate that they offered to share their time, expertise and facility with us. Thanks again, to all of you.
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(Continued from page 4)
they could have been described as the first blizzard of that season.
Almost every set arrived at its destination with a cracked back. It had been a cold fall, and during shipment all of the sets were exposed to freezing or below freezing temperatures. But the low temperature brittle point for PP homopolymer is 40F. Under normal shipping conditions the sets had bounced enough to cause almost every back to crack.
After the panic button was hit, the molder made several hundred thousand replacement backs that were then fitted in the field. Sales plummeted because most of the sets were not available for the Christmas sales season and the retrofit cost more than the profit.
The problem resulted from incomplete evaluation of the product's exposure-i.e., neglecting the temperatures that the product was exposed to in shipment. In addition, the very high brittle-transition temperature of the PP homopolymer was not clearly indicated in the data sheets. The designers evidently felt that a tough material like PP would not get brittle at what are essentially normal temperatures.
Source: www.pd3.org
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(Continued from page 1)
safely, but that tree really does a job on your car, and the sudden deceleration causes the Big Bang to happen--your airbag deploys.
I hope you never have the opportunity to experience an automotive airbag deployment (I have, after a particularly bothersome Senior Moment), but it's nice to know they work, and work well. Watching the PRS (Passive Restraint System) come together was the fascinating subject of our last dinner meeting, at Autoliv, in Ogden. Our thanks go out to Ross Loevy, Ken Love, John Sabin, Chuck Richards, Trent Heiner, Dora Colby, and their colleagues for being such thorough and gracious hosts.
We enjoyed an excellent tour, including a demonstration of an actual bag deployment in the test lab. It's truly amazing how fast the bag deploys and, just as important, how fast it deflates. I had the impression it would be soft, like a pillow, but believe me, it's not.
As we watched the bag fabric being
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(Continued from page 1)
25% decline in membership since December, 2000.
By region: North American membership (US & Canada) declined by more than 15%; Europe increased by 29% and Asia/Pacific declined by 5%. Obviously, a great deal of this decline has to do with the difficult economic situation in the plastics industry over the past two to three years.
Financial status: Unofficially, the 2002 year ended with a net loss of $260K The budget for 2003, passed at the September Council meeting, is $7.15 MM and assumes a membership base of 22,000. This will leave a surplus of $37K at the end of the year. Based on a projected membership of 18,000, the budget has been preliminarily recast at $6.15 MM. To counter
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some of the gaps in income vs. expenses, several actions have been taken: the freezing of Jenny Okamoto's position (Jenny moved to Boston with her husband); austerity on all program expenses; HQ staff is taking about a 5% pay reduction (by taking one unpaid day off per month); and there will be a reduction in governance costs through increased use of electronic communications.
ANTEC Update: Of the 1300 abstracts received, 900 have been accepted as papers for delivery at ANTEC, May 4 thru May 8, in Nashville, TN. Schedule change for ANTEC sessions: The morning Technical Sessions will run from 8:00 a.m. through 11:00 a.m., with an 11:00-1:30 Plenary session and lunch, fol
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lowed by the afternoon Technical Sessions running from 1:30 to 6:00 p.m. The SPE Celebrates! Banquet will be on Wednesday at 7 p.m. to midnight.
ANTEC Fees: This year there will be a substantial added benefit, in that the CD-ROM Proceedings will be included in the Conference registration fees. There is also a substantial reduction for purchasing registration early, in some cases as much as $170. If a printed version of the proceedings is desired, one is available for $225.
For those who have not experienced the ANTEC, I would strongly urge attendance: it's the World's largest technical conference devoted entirely to Plastics.
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