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Benvic, a French manufacturer of PVC compounds and eco-sensitive solutions, is launching a range of polymer grades through 2021 that will help eliminate unwanted static and electrical discharge from a variety of products. Named ProVinyl KCC the new conductive polymers will help dissipate electricity, protecting and regulating products as diverse as cabling, packaging, tubing and flooring as well as the environments in which they are used.
Health and safety factors, preventing blast and fire risks, data protection and other issues are all at stake when it comes to Electrostatic Discharge (ESD). To overcome these concerns Benvic’s research and development teams have created a number of compounds that can be readily used in plastics extrusion and injection moulding. ‘Speed to market and ease of polymer processing have been key to us in designing these specialty materials,’ says Benvic Product Manager, Philippe GRESSIER.
ProVinyl KCC has all the qualities of PVC (performance, durability, cost effectiveness and ease of processing) and also has the ability to conduct electrons in order to generate an electrical drain, and thus limit the accumulation of electrical charge in the plastic product.
ProVinyl KCC compounds are primarily formulated with plasticized PVC together with a conductive filler that requires great care in order to ensure homogeneity and correct functioning. Benvic has used all of its compounding expertise in order to integrate the complex chemistry in the main body of the PVC compound. ‘Our KCC materials innovation is a perfect illustration of the momentum behind the Benvic ProVinyl brand and strategy,’ says Philippe GRESSIER.
The industrial worlds of cabling and electrical equipment immediately need the protection that ProVinyl KCC can provide: these markets include cables for electrical equipment and sensors that operate at very low voltages. In order to protect these operations from fluctuation and disturbance, an antistatic drain (ESD) is directly integrated in the polymer sheath of the cable, thus ensuring stability of conductivity.
The ProVinyl KCC protection is therefore particularly suitable for applications with high reliability and failsafe requirements, such as medical monitoring devices or automotive.
Later this year the ProVinyl KCC range will be rolled out for additional applications, including tubes and hoses for industrial fluids, personal protection equipment and antistatic flooring in sensitive environments such as clean rooms, hospitals, manufacturing or assembly plants for electronic components.
