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The purpose of this paper is to present the current European status on low-density sheet moulded composite (SMC) applications in the automotive industry. SMC already has a weight reduction compared to steel. With the use of Scotchlite™ Glass Bubbles in combination with BYK®-Chemie additives, SMC can be far more improved in terms of the weight reduction, which is the primary benefit for the automotive industry. The formulations described in this paper were directly compared using automotive industry accepted test methods to quantify formulation differences. The final conclusion proves that the primary benefit of using hollow-glass microspheres in SMC, for the automotive industry, can be achieved by reducing the weight of SMC parts up to 30%.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of chemical process aids on surface quality, cross-link density and chemical process aids in hollow-glass microspheres filled Sheet Molded Composites (SMC). Published papers suggest that hollow-glass microspheres filled SMC can be produced with similar physical properties as standard calcium carbonate filled systems, with the exception of tensile and flex modulus[1][2]. Chemical process aids significantly improve standard SMC systems by increasing raw material interactions leading to improved physical properties. This paper investigates chemical process aids and divinylbenzene in a standard SMC formulation and the same formulation reformulated with hollow-glass microspheres. These formulations were then directly compared using automotive industry accepted test methods to quantify formulation differences.