Resin makers Ticona and DSM Engineering Plastics each have announced major capacity expansions

Resin makers Ticona and DSM Engineering Plastics each have announced major capacity expansions in engineering resins. Ticona’s Fortron Industries unit will expand capacity at its polyphenylene sulfide plant in Wilmington by 20 percent in the second half of 2005. The firm already is working to increase capacity 10 percent by the end of 2004.

Fortron is seeing strong demand from its traditional automotive market, as well as new growth in aerospace, filtration and extrusion, according to Fred Daniell, a Ticona veteran who was named Fortron’s president July 1.

Fortron, a joint venture of Florence, Ky.-based Ticona and Kureha Chemical Industries Ltd. of Tokyo, also is reviewing sites for a new PPS plant that would open by 2009. Wilmington is one of several sites being considered for the plant.

Evansville, Ind.-based DSM will boost capacity by 20 percent at its Stanyl-brand high-performance nylon plant in Geleen, the Netherlands, by the end of 2004. The firm also has begun engineering work for a second, similar-sized plant, which will be built either in Geleen or at a site in China. DSM officials expect to make that decision in late 2005 and to have the new plant up and running in the second half of 2007.

“We are realizing a sustained, deep growth in sales of Stanyl, and these capacity increases support this growth,” business group director Jos Gossens said in a recent news release.

Gossens cited infill panels in aircraft engines, connectors for the telecommunications and electronics industries, under-the-hood auto sensors and electronic throttle gears in new Japanese vehicles as areas where Stanyl is being used in new applications.

Ticona is a unit of Celanese AG of Frankfurt, Germany. DSM Engineering Materials is a unit of DSM NV of Heerlen, the Netherlands.