Quality improvement of foamed seals for the automotive industry

Automotive body seals and profiles are becoming increasingly complex. Unique performance properties in the areas of weather resistance, high physical properties and processability are attributed to the seals which are mostly a combination of solid and foamed materials. As there is still little knowledge about the manufacturing process, extensive investigations were done to analyse the influence of the rheological behaviour of the materials, the parameters of the extrusion process and the foaming/vulcanisation on the quality properties of the foamed seals. The evaluation allows a better process understanding which in combination with improved test methods leads to an increased product quality and reduced manufacturing costs.