Lightweight Substrates

Interfacial has developed technology to produce market leading cost effective, lightweight substrates.  These substrates offer the following advantages and benefits:

1. A method to produce lightweight substrates using low cost, lightweight fillers (SG~0.18 g/cc)
2. >40% weight reduction is typical by addition of as little as 5 wt% of the filler when processed using a continuous double belt press process
3. Ideal substrates for applications that demand lightweight materials including in the transportation, aerospace, logistics and building & construction markets

This patent pending technology involves a product by process methodology using a continuous double belt press.  The key to the technology involves a method to uniformly blend low cost, lightweight fillers with a thermoplastic binder and then scattering and consolidating these materials using a continuous double belt press process to make a lightweight sheet substrate.  For example, when recycled rigid PVC is processed in this manner with 10 wt% lightweight filler, the resulting substrate has a specific gravity between 0,9-1.0 g/cc, which is more than 40% lower than the rigid PVC resin when processed in the absence of the lightweight filler.

The resulting substrates produced using this novel combination of materials and manufacturing process have found utility in several applications in the building and construction and transportation markets.  For example, these substrates have demonstrated their commercial value and are currently sold into an acoustic panel application.  The technology has also shown extreme promise in automotive, logistics (truck doors and sidewalls) and flooring applications.