GE Plastics adds to line of Xenoy resins

GE Plastics has announced two new grades of its Xenoy resin for the molding of fuel tanks for lawn mowers, snow blowers, personal recreation vehicles, generators and other small engines. Xenoy X6800BM blow-molding and Xenoy 6620-GT injection-molding resin grades are a monolayer solution designed to meet current and upcoming California Air Resources Board (CARB) and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) standards governing small engine off-road fuel tank vapour emissions.

“The increasingly strict requirements of CARB and EPA regarding fuel permeation in small engine tanks are driving the need for new material solutions,” said GE Plastics Transportation industry manager Craig Williams in a press release. “Because existing multilayer and monolayer approaches involve significant complexity, GE Plastics developed the new Xenoy resins that offer molding simplicity, high performance, and compliance with regulations not just today, but into the future.”

According to the company, the new resins help processors avoid the costs of traditional multilayer extrusion blow-molding processes. The materials are available in both natural and pre-colored black.

Key applications for the resins include walk-behind consumer mowers, hand-held gasoline blowers and snowmobile fuel tanks.

In a webcast announcing the release of the new Xenoy resins, GE Plastics also noted that it would be releasing three new resin technologies later this month.

In other GE Plastics news, the company’s representatives did not comment on the specifics of the sale of the unit during the webcast product announcement. However, they did acknowledge that the company has completed its initial introductions and presentations to potential buyers, and the company is on track for meeting its sales goal.

General Electric Co. recently confirmed its intent to sell its Pittsfield, Mass.-based plastics division by the second half of 2007. The company’s Canadian headquarters are located in Mississauga, Ont.