Solvay Advanced Polymers, LLC, has launched a pair of new wear-resistant Torlon® polyamide-imide (PAI) grades that deliver significantly better wear performance than other available Torlon wear-resistant materials. Torlon 4630 and 4645 represent the company’s next generation of wear-resistant PAI materials for a range of high-performance applications including bushings, bearings, sliding elements, thrust washers, and needle bearing replacements for the automotive, industrial, heavy-duty equipment, and aerospace industries.

“We’ve improved the wear properties of Torlon PAI to an unprecedented level in response to OEMs who seek better performance over a range of pressures and velocities,” explains Brian Stern, Solvay Advanced Polymers’ senior global automotive market manager. These new wear-resistant grades provide an effective all-plastic alternative to more complex metal-based designs with rolling components for high-temperature friction and wear applications in lubricated and non-lubricated environments. Torlon PAI’s other key benefits include outstanding mechanical properties at high operating temperatures up to 275 C, excellent creep resistance, outstanding resistance to strong acids and most organics, exceptional compressive strength, and sealing capability.

Torlon 4630 is a graphite/PTFE-filled grade for non-lubricated environments. It provides outstanding wear resistance for both high-pressure/low-speed applications and low-pressure/high-speed applications, offering a 50 percent wear factor improvement over previous grades. The limiting PV (contact pressure times velocity) is 150,000 psi x fpm and its coefficient of linear thermal expansion (CLTE) is 40 percent lower than previous materials.

Torlon 4645 is a carbon fiber/PTFE grade for high-pressure/low-speed applications in lubricated environments and provides 100 percent wear factor improvement versus previous grades. The material boasts a limiting PV value of 750,000 psi x fpm, a low coefficient of friction of 0.05 to 0.1, and a low CLTE of 3 ppm per degree Fahrenheit for tight tolerance molding.

The two new injection molding grades complement the company’s growing portfolio of wear-resistant materials, which includes several formulations of KetaSpire® PEEK and AvaSpire® modified PEEK. Both new Torlon PAI materials are manufactured at Solvay Advanced Polymers’ Greenville, S.C. facility. They are also available in stock shapes.

About Solvay Advanced Polymers
Solvay Advanced Polymers, LLC produces more plastics with more performance than any other company in the world. This gives design engineers worldwide more ways to solve top design challenges in automotive, medical, electronics, aerospace, and other demanding industries. Learn more at www.solvayadvancedpolymers.com.

SOLVAY is an international industrial Group active in Chemistry. It offers a broad range of products and solutions that contribute to improving quality of life. The Group is headquartered in Brussels and employs about 19,000 people in 50 countries. In 2009, its consolidated sales amounted to EUR 8.5 billion. Solvay is listed on the NYSE Euronext stock exchange in Brussels (NYSE Euronext: SOLB.BE - Bloomberg: SOLB.BB - Reuters: SOLBt.BR). Details are available at www.solvay.com.

PRESS CONTACT:
Joseph Grande
413.684.2463
joe.grande@verizon.net