Kickstart: Honors for people and parts that made cars better

Probir Guha, who helped the growth of composites for auto body parts — starting with the iconic Pontiac Fiero body styling and continuing through pickup truck beds still in production — will receive the Automotive Division of the Society of Plastics Engineers 2022 Lifetime Achievement Award at the Automotive Innovation Awards and Gala event Nov. 2 in Livonia, Mich.

Guha spent much of his career at Budd Co., which later became part of ThyssenKrupp and Continental Structural Plastics. He also holds 179 patents.

His work in launching a structural glass fiber vinylester sheet molded compound for the Ford Explorer Sport Trac pickup box in 2000 won an SPE Automotive Innovation award in 2000.

Since retiring in 2021, Guha has formed a technology consulting company, Composites Innovations Inc., focused on lightweight materials and "smart composite technologies."

The first molded-in-color weatherable grille, used on the 1986 Volkswagen Golf, won the 2022 Hall of Fame for the SPE Automotive Innovation Awards. The grille used Luran S ASA from Ineos Styrolution.

To be eligible for the Hall of Fame, an auto part must have been in continuous service for at least 15 years and be broadly adopted in the auto industry.

Refrigerators are, of course, a great place to store leftovers so food doesn't go to waste. A group of four companies in Germany wants to find a way to capture polyurethane insulation once the appliance has reached the end of its useful life, so that the material used in that refrigerator doesn't go to waste either.

Materials maker BASF, machinery supplier KrausMaffei, electronics recycling specialist Remondis and chemical recycler Rampf say that current programs capture only about 30 percent of the energy used to produce it. If the PU can be captured and chemically recycled, nearly all that plastic can go into new materials.

The four partners in the collaboration will be using a depolymerization process that can be used to make new polyurethane materials, closing the material cycle.

Our sister paper Urethanes Technology International has more on the project.

If dressing like your favorite superhero isn't good enough, how about having a 3D printed replica of the hero with your face?

Toymaker Hasbro is working with 3D printing firm Formlabs of Somerville, Mass., on the Selfie Series of action figures that have specialized heads molded to mimic the faces of buyers.

Figures available include Spiderman and other Marvel superheroes along with characters from Ghostbusters, Power Rangers, GI Joe and Star Wars. Buyers use the camera on their phone or a tablet to scan their face and create a file that is used to create a head that is popped onto an action figure.

"They want to immortalize themselves in plastic," Brian Chapman, head of global design and development for Hasbro, said in a promotional video.

Hasbro said a key to the program was Formlabs' ability to create individual heads — and with proprietary resin that could duplicate varying skin tones — but at a price point most fans could afford. The 6-inch figures are priced at $59.99.