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Flax and wood fibers increasingly present
Did you know that cars contain more and more natural fibers and materials? Although the idea is not new in the automobile industry, it is nevertheless growing unprecedentedly.
This is a highly topical issue, with the price of a barrel of oil reaching the psychological barrier of 100 dollars. Anticipating this trend, Faurecia is designing instrument panels made of composite materials, combining polypropylene and flax, called PP-flax. Wood fibers also have pride of place in door panels, where they represent 63 to 73% of this component. They can be associated both with polypropylene (PP-WF) and polyester (PES-WF).
In either case, using these biomass materials enables 25 to 30% gains in the weight of these components.
Among the vehicles using wood fibers can be mentioned the Citroën C4 and Toyota Corolla and Avensis, but also the Audi A4, Ford C-Max or the Volvo C70 Coupé.
Flax is now an integral part of the vehicle interiors of the Opel Astra or the Smart ForTwo.
It should be underlined finally, that today, Faurecia is one of the only suppliers in the world to have developed these products, often present in so-called "premium" cars.
Find out more about Sustainable design innovation on Premium Attitude
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Polypropylen-Flax on Smart Fortwo Instrument panel
Polyester-Wood Fiber on a Audi A4 Door panel frame
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