Plastics Technology - Dedicated to improving Plastics Processing.
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starting up industry & technology news New TPE Lures Could 'Change Fishing Forever' Anglers, take note: Those fishing lures that look so colorful in the package on the store shelf have little or no appeal to fish in deep or cloudy water. Fish do see in color and use it to hunt for food, but as a fishing lure sinks into water, the deeper it goes, the less light penetrates, and the lure loses iridescence, color, and contrast. For example, the most brilliant red turns almost to black at 45 ft below the surface. Cloudy or murky water, or adverse weather conditions, only detract more from the lure's visibility and attractiveness to fish. Armed with this information, Robert Senter What's more, the plastic blends are tailored to allow each lure to sink and remain at a specified depth from 2 to 60 ft or more, using no lead weights. Said to be the first of their kind, Actiglo of Castle Rock. Colo., an avid fisherman with a degree in chemistry, knowledge of polymers, and years of experience in the medical supply field, aimed to do something about it. He heads up R2 Innovations, LLC, which has patented new Actiglo fishing lures (actiglolures.com). These U.S.-made products use proprietary mixtures of plastics with transparent colorants and mini LEDs to light up the colorful, iridescent lures at any depth and under any water conditions. lures are made using a half-dozen TPEs from Alliance Polymers & Services, LLC, Romulus, Mich. R2 Innovations wanted non-yellowing plastics with soft touch and flexibility, tensile strength of 700 to 7000 psi for "bite resistance," densities that would allow them to float or sink to spe- cific depths, appropriate optical properties to remain bright and appealing to fish, good colorability and moldability, and no plastisols or harmful ingredients. The lures were engineered by WayneGo Design in Evergreen, Colo., headed by Wayne Gon- nering, another avid fisherman. Injection molding was by High Performance Engi- neering in Colorado Springs. t BQTUQF DPN "MHBF 11 )ZCSJE $BO #F 5IFSNPGPSNFE Algae and plastics do mix—that's the message to be delivered at the upcoming Pack Expo, Oct. 28-31 at Chicago's McCormick Place. Dordan Manufacturing Co. Inc., Woodstock, Ill., will introduce the first-ever thermoformed sample of an algae/plastic compound. The material for this non-commercial demonstration part was formu- lated by Algix, Bogart, Ga., which has collabo- rated with the Univ. of Georgia and Kimberly- Clark to commercialize the cultivation of aquatic biomass, such as algae, as a feedstock for bio- based plastic compounds. Algix furnished Dordan with a 500-micron- thick sheet of 20% algae and 80% PP. Algix has developed algae-based formulations for a variety of other materials, including PLA and virtually all types of polyethylene, says Ryan Hunt, the com- pany's director of R&D.; Compounding and sheet extrusion were performed by Interfacial Solutions 4 AUGUST 2012 PLASTICS TECHNOLOGY LLC, River Falls, Wis. Algix is in discussions with companies in Georgia, where more than 150 car- pet plants produce millions of gallons of nutrient- rich waste water that could be used to scale up biomass production to a fully commercial level. Notes Daniel Slavin, Dordan president and CEO. "We are excited about the potential of Algix's algae-plastic because it uses industrial waste, as opposed to agricultural byproducts, as feedstock." Meanwhile, Cereplast, Inc., El Segundo, Calif., has been developing algae biomass as a partial replacement for starch in its PP-based Sustainables family of compounds (see Nov. '10 Close Up). The first commercial use appeared in April 2011 in a collection of hair accessories from The Barrette Factory, Hollywood, Calif. t EPSEBO DPN t BMHJYMMD DPN t DFSFQMBTU DPN