Magna shows strong presence at SPE Central Europe auto awards

Neuss, Germany — A skid plate on a Mercedes Benz sports utility vehicle was one of the top winners in the Society of Plastics Engineers Central Europe's annual automotive awards.

The part, made by Magna International Inc.'s Magna Exteriors business, was one of several prizes the company collected at the awards.

Graham Burrow, Magna Exteriors global president, said the polypropylene skid plate weighs much less than conventional skid plates in PVC or ABS. His colleague Johannes Götzelmann, director product and process development exteriors Europe at Magna Exteriors GmbH, added that “the technique is not unique, but the way we apply it is.”

Magna Exteriors was involved with four exterior applications submitted to the SPE jury. Winners and runners-up were presented at the organization's traditional Automotive Awards Night in Neuss, Germany, on Oct. 17.

Magna Exteriors, with European operations based in Sailauf, Germany, and global headquarters in Concord, Ontario, took both the exterior category first place and grand award for the skid plate under the bumper of the 2014 Mercedes GLA X156. Magna produces the skid plate in a mold from the Grupo Simoldes Tool Group subsidiary MDA Moldes de Azeméis SA in Oliveira de Azeméis, Portugal, on Engel Holdings GmbH equipment. The material used is a colored Polyfort filled PP from A. Schulman Inc. (Hall 8a/D12).

Key features of the application are metallic appearance direct from the mold and associated substitution of conventional paint processes. To avoid defects typical in metallic pigmented compounds, Magna produces the part using five injection gates in a cascade molding process. The properties of the PP compound also were essential to success of the development.

Magna also took the second exterior place for the “Actero” active dynamics automatic cooling grille shutter system, injection molded on KraussMaffei Group (Hall 15/C24/C27) machinery in 15 percent and 30 percent Durethan BKV glass-fiber-reinforced nylon from Lanxess AG (Hall 6/C76). The system has been applied on the Mercedes E-Class car since November 2015.

Dimensions of the black painted and chromed grille louvers are critical to proper functioning of the grille system, Burrow said, adding “the finish has to appeal to Daimler too when the [louvers] are in the closed position, something that is more of a challenge with conventional open grilles with active shutters mounted behind the grille. What makes this product unique is that the active portion is embedded in the grille itself.”

Burrow maintained that the E-Class active grille shutter system is the “most advanced in the market, so we are ahead of the competition with it.”

Magna picked up a fourth place award for a carbon-fiber-reinforced expoxide hood on General Motors Co.'s Cadillac ATX-V and CTS-V. The company's Polycon Industries division in Guelph, Ontario, has been compression molding the hood since August 2015 from pre-impregnated sheets from Barraday Advanced Materials Solutions in Canada with Century Tool & Gauge tooling on a 2,500-metric-ton press from Krefeld, Germany-based G. Siempelkamp Maschinen und Anlagenbau GmbH & Co. KG (Hall 12/A36)

Burrow said the hood represents the “first higher volume exterior carbon fiber product in the market, and the first to achieve this kind of volume of 10,000 to 15,000 hoods per year.”

Carbon fiber also played a role in Magna's fourth place finish in the powertrain category for a CF-reinforced thermoplastic grille opening reinforcement used in Ford Motor Co.'s Mustang Shelby GT350.

The company is using Ultramid A3WC4 grade of 20 percent CF-reinforced nylon 6/6 from BASF SE (Hall 5/C21/D21) at Magna's Plastcoat Division in Brampton, Ontario. The part is molded on KraussMaffei machinery with an injection mold from Magna Tycos Tool & Die.

A particular innovation is the use of resistive implant welding (RIW) to weld two upper and lower moldings into a single part with so much rigidity that Götzelmann claimed it as “the world's first CF all-thermoplastic front-end carrier.” He admitted there are some metal inserts for screws, “but compared with conventional hybrid systems, the GOR [grill opening reinforcement] is otherwise free of metal as a structural material.”

Other innovations included:

• Volkswagen AG received an innovation award for development of a 6-meter-high composite lifting system for lifting cars in its production plants.

• Lohne, Germany-based Pöppelmann Kunststoff-Technik GmbH & Co. KG (Hall 5/B38) reached fifth place in the body interior category for the first automotive large-area serial component in organic sheet in the form of a module carrier plate for a Mercedes S-Class cabriolet car introduced in June 2015.

• BBP Kunststoffwerk Marbach Baier GmbH (Hall 8a/B37) took fifth place for a two-part plastic oil pan in the Akulon Ultraflow K-FKG7 grade of 35 percent glass fiber reinforced PA6 from DSM Engineering Plastics (Hall 6/B11).

• The powertrain innovation award went to BMW AG in Landshut, Germany, for development of a single steering shaft in a CFRP/metal hybrid design, using composite material from Xperion Components GmbH. BMW introduced the hybrid shaft from June 2014 on certain M3 and M4 models and from February on further M3 and M4 models.