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US 11,938,670 B2Granted
Powder coated vacuum formed articles
AssigneeGM Global Technology Operations LLC
InventorsThomas E. Houck, Martin Aaron Butkovich
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Abstract
A method of forming a thermoplastic plastic component includes applying an amount of pigmented powder to a sheet of thermoplastic, heating the sheet of thermoplastic to a selected temperature, melting the amount of pigmented powder on the sheet of thermoplastic to form a coating, re-heating the sheet of thermoplastic to another selected temperature, positioning the sheet of thermoplastic over a pattern, and vacuum forming the sheet of thermoplastic to form the sheet of thermoplastic into the pattern.
Claims10
A method of forming a thermoplastic plastic component comprising:
- introducing a sheet of thermoplastic into an oven;
- heating the sheet of thermoplastic to a selected temperature in the oven;
- removing the sheet of thermoplastic from the oven and applying an amount of pigmented powder to the sheet of thermoplastic;
- returning the sheet of thermoplastic coated with the amount of pigmented powder back to the oven;
- heating the sheet of thermoplastic and the amount of pigmented powder in the oven;
- bonding the pigmented powder to the sheet of thermoplastic by melting and partially curing the amount of pigmented powder on the sheet of thermoplastic to form a bonded coating of pigmented powder in the oven;
- re-heating the sheet of thermoplastic and the bonded coating of pigmented powder to another selected temperature;
- positioning the sheet of thermoplastic over a pattern in a vacuum forming system;
- and vacuum forming the sheet of thermoplastic after bonding the pigmented powder to form the sheet of thermoplastic into the pattern.
6 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.