MATERIAL STRUCTURE OF A NEEDLED NONWOVEN

Abstract

A needled nonwoven for the manufacture of, in particular, textile wheel arch liners, has different materials in its individual layers across the thickness.

Claims

1. Needled nonwoven for the production of, in particular, textile wheel treads for motor vehicles, containing 5 to 14 individual nonwoven layers, with a grammage of the nonwoven in the range from 650 g/m.sup.2 to 1900 g/m.sup.2, the base nonwoven comprising PP/PET, PP/BiCo/PET, PP/BiCo or PET/BiCo fibres, wherein the individual layers—corresponding in particular to the acoustic and mechanical requirements of a textile wheel arch liner—comprise identical or different materials as ground material and/or fibres and/or flakes and/or powder in identical or different quantities in layers and needled in the material composite.

2. Use of a needled nonwoven according to claim 1 for the manufacture of motor vehicle exterior components.

3. A process for the production of needled nonwovens according to claim 1, wherein by means of scattering devices, which are located between the doffer transport belts of a carding machine, the same or different materials are interspersed as ground material and/or fibres and/or flakes and/or powder between the fibre piles in accordance with the, in particular, acoustic and mechanical requirements of a textile wheel arch shell, the switching on and/or control of the scattering devices takes place in accordance with the required material type and quantity, the fibre piles with the intermediary regrind and/or fibre and/or flake and/or powder material types are each placed in a single layer, one lays the individual layers into a fleece, and the laid material composite is needled.

4. The process according to claim 3, characterised in that the same or different materials are used as ground material and/or fibres and/or flakes and/or powder. interspersed in layers across the width of the fleece in varying amounts (g/m.sup.2).

Description

EXAMPLE OF EXECUTION

Example 1

[0054] For the production of a deformation-resistant/stable nonwoven, 5, comprising 8 individual layers with a total grammage of 1200 g/m.sup.2 for the production of textile wheel arch liners (see FIG. 2). 2), 120 g/m.sup.2 of PET/PP ground material mixed with hydrophobised PET short fibre material is scattered into a first layer, 1, and a second layer, 2, later facing the wheel, and 150 g/m.sup.2 of PP/PET/BiCo ground material is scattered into the outer layer, 3, later facing the car body, and needled into the composite, the base fleece, 4, itself consisting of 40% PP and 60% PET fibres.

[0055] The fleece is then formed into wheel arch shells using standard processes [contact heating field (T=200° C.; t=50 sec; gap width=4 mm), tool (T=20° C.; t=50 sec; gap width=3 mm)].

[0056] Due to the material scattered on the wheel side, the wheel arch liner has improved behaviour in terms of stone impact resistance, water absorption and ice accumulation.

Example 2

[0057] With the aim of improving the wheel arch strength/stiffness, a fleece is produced from 10 layers with a grammage of 1400 g/m.sup.2. In the first layer facing the wheel, 150 g/m.sup.2 of PP/PET/BiCo ground material is interspersed, in the second layer following the first layer 150 g/m.sup.2 of PP/PET/BiCo ground material is interspersedand in the seventh layer facing the car body, 150 g/m.sup.2 of PP/PET/BiCo/carbon fibre ground material is interspersed, laid into a composite and needled in the composite, whereby the base fleece itself consists of 40% PP and 60% PET fibres. The wheel arch liners produced from this meet the specifications with regard to the increased strength requirements.