Page 278 - Engineering Plastics Handbook

240 Engineering Plastics

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Sumitomo Chemical bought the EKKCEL business from Carborundum
and began to supply the product in the Japanese market under the trade-
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mark of EKONOL in 1979. Sumitomo Chemical has manufactured
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EKONOL (SUMIKASUPER LCP ), using a kneader-type polyconden-
sation reactor [3]. The technology of Carborundum was also sold to Dartco,
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and the LCP was commercialized as XYDAR in 1984. XYDAR was also
marketed in Japan by Nippon Petrochemical in 1986, but Dartco sold the
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XYDAR business to Amoco in 1989 [4, 5]. Then Solvay acquired XYDAR ®
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from Amoco in 2001. In 1985, Celanese commercialized VECTRA , whose
composition is HBA/6-hydroxy-2-naphtoic acid (HNA)[6, 7]. Hoechst
acquired Celanese in 1987, and then the LCP business was transferred to
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the independent company Ticona. VECTRA is also being marketed in
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Japan by Polyplastics. Unitika developed RODRUN based on HBA/PET
under the license from Eastman Kodak in 1986. At the same time,
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Mitsubishi Kasei commercialized NOVACCURATE based on HBA/PET,
which was produced by a unique polymerization technique. Since LCPs
have various excellent characteristics not realized by the conventional
engineering plastics, other chemical companies such as BASF
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(ULTRAX ), Bayer (POLYSTAL ), ICI (VICTREX SRP), Idemitsu
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Petrochemical (IDEMITSU LCP ), Granmont (GRANLAR ), Rhone-
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Poulenc (RHODESTER ), Kawasaki Steel (K-LCP ), Tosoh Susteel, and
Mitsubishi Gas Chemical had been engaged in the development of LCPs
from 1986 to 1990 [8]. Thus, many chemical companies were seeking
new business opportunities in the LCP market, but at that moment, the
worldwide market for LCPs still remained small. Accordingly, most of
above-mentioned companies had withdrawn from the LCP business. In the
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1990s, Toray (SIVERAS ) and DuPont (ZENITE ) started commercial
production of LCP. DuPont announced that it acquired Eastman’s TITAN ®
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(THERMX ) and strengthened its ZENITE LCP lineup in 2003 [9].
Suppliers of LCP at present are shown in Table 11.1.
TABLE 11.1 Suppliers of LCP
Supplier Trade name
Solvay (Amoco) (United States) XYDAR ®
Nippon Petrochem. (Japan) (importers) XYDAR ®
DuPont (United States) ZENITE ®
Ticona (United States) VECTRA ®
Sumitomo Chem. (Japan) SUMIKASUPER LCP ®
Polyplastics (Japan) VECTRA ®
Toray (Japan) SIVERAS ®
Ueno Fine Chem. (Japan) UENO LCP ®
Unitika (Japan) RODRUN ®
Mitsubishi Chem. (Japan) NOVACCURATE ®