An expanded polypropylene resin particle is obtained from a base material resin having a melting point of 140° C. to 150° C., wherein the base material resin includes a polypropylene resin A including 3 weight % to 15 weight % of 1-butene and having a melting point of 130° C. to 140° C.; and a polypropylene resin B having a melting point of 145° C. to 165° C., and wherein the expanded polypropylene resin particle has an average cell diameter of 100 μm to 340 μm.

The invention relates to a method of preparing expanded thermoplastic microspheres from thermally expandable thermoplastic microspheres comprising a polymer shell encapsulating a foaming agent, the method comprising heating the expandable microspheres within a flexible container (2) to effect expansion of said microspheres and withdrawing gas from said flexible container (2). The invention further relates to an expansion device for preparing such expanded thermoplastic microspheres.

The present invention disclosed a foam product and the manufacturing method thereof. The foam product includes a foam core, an outer skin, a cross-linked foam sheet and a bottom plate, wherein the aforementioned layers are all pre-made. The cross-linked foam sheet is laminated onto a bottom surface of the foam core, and the outer skin is then laminated onto a top surface and a periphery of the foam core. Lastly, the bottom plate is laminated onto the cross-linked foam sheet, wherein, the bottom plate has a non cross-linked foam sheet and a non-foam plastic plate, so that when the bottom plate is laminated onto the crossed-link foam sheet, the non cross-linked foam sheet is sandwiched between the cross-linked foam sheet and the non-foam plastic plate.

The invention relates to a method for impregnating a polymer granulate with a predefined mass of a gaseous propellant. According to the invention, the polymer granulate is arranged inside a pressure vessel and a gaseous propellant is introduced into the inside of the pressure vessel.

In an injection molded product of the invention, an unevenness forming portion having unevenness formed by thermal expansion of thermally expandable capsules is formed. The injection molded product includes a highly expanded portion that is formed at a surface side of the unevenness forming portion in a thickness direction of the injection molded product and in which the thermally expandable capsules are thermally expanded, and a main body portion that is a portion adjacent to the highly expanded portion in the thickness direction and in which the thermally expandable capsules are substantially not thermally expanded. The thickness of the highly expanded portion is a half or smaller than the thickness of the injection molded product in the unevenness forming portion, and a polymer material of the highly expanded portion and a polymer material of the main body portion are the same polymer material.

A method of manufacturing a footwear sole component is provided including projecting elongated pins into a mold cavity in the shape of the footwear sole component and partially filled with an expandable material including multiple unexpanded beads, and introducing steam into the cavity through ports defined by one or more cavity walls and through the pins in an internal region of the expandable material, to expand both exterior beads and interior beads in the internal region a predetermined amount. With the elongated pins, the interior beads can be expanded more, less and/or the same amount as exterior beads to provide particular physical characteristics to the component. For example, the interior beads can be fully expanded to a similar density as exterior beads, or expanded less to provide more density and rigidity in the internal region, or expanded more to provide less density and rigidity in the internal region.

System and methods for recycling a material comprising a polymer in an expanded state is disclosed. The system can include a shredder, a heating chamber operatively connected to the shredder, a condenser operatively connected to the heating chamber, a solvent tank operatively connected to the condenser, and a circulation unit operatively connected to the solvent tank and the heating chamber.

A process for manufacturing an expanded polystyrene foam article from used expanded polystyrene foam articles in combination with virgin polystyrene foam, the process comprising the steps of: stacking a plurality of individual used expanded polystyrene foam articles in a vertical block machine to occupy at least 20% of the internal volume in the block machine; conveying virgin polystyrene beads into the internal volume of the vertical block machine to occupy at least some of the remaining internal volume of the block machine by mixing the virgin polystyrene with the used stacked foam articles; and heating the internal volume of the block machine to a temperature of at least 75° C. by supplying pressurised steam into the heated internal volume of the block machine to fuse the virgin expanded polystyrene beads and the stacked expanded polystyrene foam articles to form the expanded polystyrene foam article.

A skin-covered foamed molded article having excellent lightweight property, bending rigidity, and favorable dimensional stability, which includes: a skin material composed of a hollow molded body produced by blow-molding an extruded parison; and an expanded bead molded article located inside the skin material, wherein the skin material has an average wall thickness of from 1.0 mm to 5.0 mm, the skin material includes a glass fiber-reinforced polypropylene-based resin containing glass fiber in a range of from 5 mass % to 30 mass %, the glass fiber has a weight-average fiber length of from 0.4 mm to 1.5 mm, the expanded bead molded article includes a polypropylene-based resin, the peeling strength between the skin material and the expanded bead molded article is 0.1 MPa or higher, and the longitudinal linear expansion coefficient of the skin-covered foamed molded article (100) at from 23° C. to 80° C. is 7×10−5/° C. or lower.

The invention relates to a method for the combined processing of at least two polymer melts selected from the group consisting of (M1), (M2) and (M3), wherein (M1) is a polymer melt comprising a terephthalate polyester (A1), (M2) is a polymer melt comprising a copolyester (A2) on the basis of terephthalic acid, at least one aliphatic, ω-dicarboxylic acid and at least one aliphatic 1,ω-diol, and (M3) is a polymer melt 0 comprising a copolyester (A3) on the basis of terephthalic acid, at least one polytetramethylene glycol and at least one aliphatic 1,ω-diol. The method comprises the alternating processing of the at least two polymer melts into at least one product selected from the group consisting of pellets (P1), fibers (P2), expanded particles (P3), preforms (P4) and articles (P5).