Non-Halogenated flexible resin for sustainable, high-end, FR insulation tubing

24-May-10

Through co-development efforts with SABIC Innovative Plastics, Japan’s Nissei Eco Company Ltd. has created a unique solution to significantly reduce the environmental impact of wire harness insulation. That solution is ECO-01 tubing, a wire insulation product made from SABIC Innovative Plastics’ Flexible Noryl* resin. This high-tech resin is inherently flame retardant (FR) and free of environmentally harmful heavy metals. It also provides OEMs of home appliances and other products with high heat performance without expensive secondary operations. SABIC Innovative Plastics’ continued investment in high-performance, green technologies is helping customers like Nissei Eco accelerate the creation of differentiated, environmentally progressive end products in an array of markets worldwide. Michio Inamura, CEO, Nissei Eco says, “The key to this success was replacing potentially harmful flame-retardant materials without sacrificing high performance or raising costs. Flexible Noryl resin met all of our requirements for the new ECO-01 product line and, thanks to this exceptional SABIC Innovative Plastics material, our customers are very pleased with what the new tubing has to offer.” Flexible Noryl resin for wire insulation offers OEMs a significantly better material choice vs. traditional polyvinyl chloride (PVC), which contains halogen chlorine. Not only is the resin non-halogenated to help customers meet global environmental requirements, but the FR material also surpasses PVC in wear resistance. As measured by the JASO-D-608-92 abrasion test, the resin has much higher abrasion resistance than that of PVC. The resin surpasses other non-halogenated materials such as flame-retardant polyethylene (PE) in terms of affordability and processing ease. Because Flexible Noryl resin delivers high-temperature performance and can meet the requirements of UL105C, it does not require cross linking using electron beam radiation – a process that is necessary for flame-retardant PE. Cross linking adds time and cost, and also makes the material stiffer and harder to process. ECO-01 tubing for wire harnesses has been specified by several home appliance manufacturers in Japan, while Nissei Eco is actively working to gain specifications around the globe.