Sandwich-Type, Composite Component Having a Sprayed Backside Protective Coating

Abstract

A sandwich-type, composite component having a sprayed backside protective coating is provided. The component includes a first outer layer having an outer surface, a second outer layer and a core positioned between and bonded to the outer layers and having a plurality of cavities. The protective coating is integrally formed from an elastomeric material. The material is sprayed to form the coating and the coating is bonded to the outer surface by curing. The component may be a vehicle interior component such as a vehicle load floor component.

Claims

1. A sandwich-type, composite component having a sprayed backside protective coating, the component comprising: a first outer layer having an outer surface; a protective coating integrally formed from a sprayable liquid elastomeric material; a second outer layer; and a core positioned between the outer layers and having a plurality of cavities, wherein the outer layers are bonded to the core, the material is sprayed to form the coating and the coating is bonded to the outer surface by curing the coating on the outer surface.

2. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the elastomeric material is either a thermoset material or a thermoplastic material.

3. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the coating is made of a textured material.

4. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the coating is made of a synthetic rubber material.

5. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the coating is made of a rubberized plastic material.

6. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the coating is an acoustic barrier layer of sound-damping, elastomeric material.

7. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the coating comprises a layer of liquid rubber polymer sprayed either directly unto the outer surface or onto an interior surface of a mold used to bond the outer layers to the core in a press molding process.

8. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the core is a cellular core.

9. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the core is a thermoplastic core.

10. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the core is a honeycomb core.

11. The component as claimed in claim 10, wherein the honeycomb core is a thermoplastic honeycomb core.

12. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the outer layers are fiber-reinforced plastic layers.

13. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the second outer layer is a load-bearing layer.

14. The component as claimed in claim 1, wherein the outer surface is a B-surface.

15. The component as claimed in claim 6, wherein the acoustic barrier layer has a thickness that ranges from approximately 0.1 mm to approximately 4.0 mm to provide noise transmission obstruction.

16. A sandwich-type, vehicle interior component having a sprayed backside protective coating, the component comprising: a first outer layer having an outer surface; a protective coating integrally formed from a sprayable liquid elastomeric material; a second outer layer; and a core positioned between the outer layers and having a plurality of cavities, wherein the outer layers are bonded to the core, the material is sprayed to form the coating and the coating is bonded to the outer surface by curing the coating on the outer surface.

17. The component as claimed in claim 16, wherein the elastomeric material is either a thermoset, sound-damping material or a thermoplastic, sound-damping material for noise reduction in the vehicle.

18. A sandwich-type, vehicle load floor component having a sprayed backside protective coating, the component comprising: a first outer layer having an outer surface; a protective coating integrally formed from a sprayable liquid elastomeric material; a second outer layer; and a core positioned between the outer layers and having a plurality of cavities, wherein the outer layers are bonded to the core, the material is sprayed to form the coating and the coating is bonded to the outer surface by curing the coating on the outer surface.

19. The component as claimed in claim 18, wherein the elastomeric material is either a thermoset, sound-damping material or a thermoplastic sound-damping material for noise reduction in the vehicle.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0056] FIG. 1 is an environmental view, partially broken away, of a prior art load floor with a movable cover in its open position to show imprinted 3-D structures on backside of the cover;

[0057] FIG. 2 is a view, similar to the view of FIG. 1, that shows a sprayed backside protective coating on a moveable cover of a load floor constructed in accordance with at least one embodiment of the present invention;

[0058] FIG. 3 is a side sectional view, partially broken away, showing various separate layers of a prior art stack or blank of thermoplastic layers of material;

[0059] FIG. 4 is a top perspective sectional view of the stack of FIG. 3, but without outer carpet layers after low pressure, cold compression molding;

[0060] FIG. 5 is an enlarged upside down view, partially broken away and in cross-section, of a sandwich-type, composite component after an outer, bottom, class-B surface of one of the outer layers has been sprayed and cured with a liquid elastomeric material to form a protective coating;

[0061] FIG. 6 is a view, partially broken away, showing a vision sensor and a multi-axis robot having a sprayer controlled by a controller wherein the robot is capable of spraying the liquid elastomeric material on the backside of a sandwich-type, composite component conveyed by a conveyor; and

[0062] FIG. 7 is an enlarged view, partially broken away, and taken within the phantom rectangle labeled 7 of FIG. 6, of the sprayer wherein a first portion of a component is bare (i.e. before spraying of the material), a second intermediate portion of the component is wet after spraying and a third portion of the component is dry after the liquid material has cured.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0063] As required, detailed embodiments of the present invention are disclosed herein; however, it is to be understood that the disclosed embodiments are merely exemplary of the invention that may be embodied in various and alternative forms. The figures are not necessarily to scale; some features may be exaggerated or minimized to show details of particular components. Therefore, specific structural and functional details disclosed herein are not to be interpreted as limiting, but merely as a representative basis for teaching one skilled in the art to variously employ the present invention.

[0064] Referring to FIGS. 2, 5 and 6 there is shown a carpeted, automotive vehicle, load floor, generally indicated at 110, including a compression-molded, composite panel constructed in accordance with at least one embodiment of the present invention. A cover, generally indicated at 112, of the load floor 110 covers a storage area 114 of the vehicle and is pivotally connected to the composite panel. A substantially continuous carpet layer 120 may be bonded to the outer, top, class-A surface 121 of the panel and the top surface of the cover 112 to at least partially form the carpeted load floor 110 having the carpeted cover 112. A living hinge 123 allows the carpeted cover 112 to pivot between different use positions including the open position of FIG. 2. A decorative, noise-management covering layer or protective coating 125 is bonded to the bottom surface of the cover 112 (as well as the bottom surface 127 of the rest of the load floor 110) to reduce the level of undesirable noise in a passenger compartment of the vehicle in its closed position and to provide an aesthetically pleasing appearance to the bottom of the cover 112 in its open position (i.e. FIG. 2).

[0065] As is well known in the art, the load floor 110 is typically manufactured by providing a stack of material located or positioned within a mold (not shown). The stack includes first and second reinforced thermoplastic skins or outer layers 114 and 118, respectively, a core 116 having a large number of cavities such as a thermoplastic cellular core disposed between and bonded to the skins 114 and 118 by press molding. The substantially continuous covering or carpet layer 120 is typically made of thermoplastic material and covers the first skin 114. The skins 114 and 118 are heated typically outside of the mold to a softening temperature. The mold is preferably a low-pressure, compression mold which performs a thermo-compression process on the stack of materials.

[0066] The thermoplastic carpet layer 120 not only covers the first skin 114, but also covers and is bonded to an outer surface of the outer skin of the cover 112. An intermediate portion of the layer 120 may not be bonded to the outer skin to form the living hinge 123. The living hinge 123 allows the carpeted cover 112 to pivot between the different use positions.

[0067] The carpet layer 120 may be resin carpet and the resin may be polypropylene. One side of the cover 112 may be covered with the carpet layer 120 which may be made of a woven or nonwoven material (typically of the carpet type).

[0068] The cellular core 116 may be a honeycomb core. In this example, the cellular core 116 has an open-celled structure of the type made up of tubes or a honeycomb, and it is made mainly of polyolefin and preferably of polypropylene. It is also possible to use a cellular structure having closed cells of the foam type. Alternatively, the core 116 may be made of cellulose (i.e. treated paper).

[0069] Each of the skins 114 and 118 may be fiber reinforced. The thermoplastic of the skins 114 and 118, the covering layer 120 and the core 114 may be polypropylene. At least one of the skins 114 and 118 may be woven skin, such as polypropylene skin. Each of the skins 114 and 118 may be reinforced with fibers, e.g., glass fibers, carbon fibers or natural fibers. At least one of the skins 114 and 118 may advantageously be made up of woven glass fiber fabric and of a thermoplastic material.

[0070] The resulting hinged load floor 110 may have a thickness in the range of 5 to 25 mm.

[0071] In one example method of making the hinged load floor 110, stacks of material may be pressed in a low pressure cold-forming mold. The stack is made up of the first skin 114, the cellular core 116, the second skin 118 and the covering layer 120, and is pressed at a pressure lying in the range of 1010.sup.5 Pa. to 3010.sup.5 Pa. The first and second skins 114 and 118 are preferably pre-heated to make them malleable and stretchable. Advantageously, in order to soften the first and second skins 114 and 118, respectively, heat is applied to a pre-assembly constituted by the stack made up of at least the first skin 114, the cellular core 116, and the second skin 118 so that, while a part of the load floor 110 is being formed in the mold, the first and second skins 114 and 118 have a forming temperature lying approximately in the range of 160 C. to 200 C., and, in this example, about 180 C. In like fashion, the cover 112 may be formed.

[0072] The protective coating 125 may be integrally formed from a sprayable liquid elastomeric material generally of the type described in U.S. Pat. No. 8,137,500. The material typically is a sprayable low-viscosity, rubber, sound-damping compound based on liquid rubbers or elastomers and vulcanization agents, which may contain small quantities of structure-reinforcing fiber fillers, and have a very low viscosity in the application state. As shown in FIG. 6, acoustic compounds of this kind are sprayable with the aid of fully automatic application systems, such as a spray robot, generally indicated at 140, controlled by a robot controller. The controller typically receives control signals from a vision or optical sensor 142 to control the spray robot 140 and a liquid sprayer 144 carried by the robot 140. As shown in FIG. 6, typically, load floors are carried by a conveyor 146 under the sensor 142 past the robot 140 which sprays the load floors upon being sensed by the sensor 142. Different stages of the spraying process are shown in FIG. 7 (i.e. bare, wet and dry). Using an automatic application system allows one to easily change colors of the material.

[0073] The elastomeric material may be either a thermoset material or a thermoplastic material or a mixture of both. The material may be a polyurethane.

[0074] The elastomeric material may be a textured material.

[0075] The elastomeric material may be synthetic rubber material or a rubberized plastic material. The acoustic barrier layer or coating 125 may be sprayed either directly on the outer surface 127 of the skin 118 or onto an interior surface of a mold used to bond the skins 118 and 114 to the core 116 in a press molding process.

[0076] The resulting thickness of the coating 125 typically is in the range of approximately 0.1 mm to approximately 4.0 mm to provide noise transmission obstruction.

[0077] While exemplary embodiments are described above, it is not intended that these embodiments describe all possible forms of the invention. Rather, the words used in the specification are words of description rather than limitation, and it is understood that various changes may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. Additionally, the features of various implementing embodiments may be combined to form further embodiments of the invention.