14 DAY TRIAL // Take a good look inside the new Ford Focus the next time you have the chance, specifically at its instrument panel. Why? Because you’ll get the chance to see how a sustainable, plant-sourced castor oil-based foam offers a soft-touch texture.
Taking much less time to produce, the castor oil blend castor oil blend is more durable, and minimizes component stretch to help optimize airbag deployment.
Castor oil is derived from the Ricinus Communis flowering spurge plant, whose oil presents a sustainable interior foam solution that does not compete with food sources.
Employing more than 10 percent renewable content, the resulting foam product passes all Ford performance requirements for interior components.
“Castor oil from plants helps deliver sustainable interior foam that reduces petroleum use while improving vehicle craftsmanship. It’s beneficial both for the customer and Mother Nature,” said Bari Brown, Ford advanced product development engineer.
The company also claims that by using the new blend, productivity is improved and the manufacturing process is simplified by the 43 percent reduction in time for the castor oil-based foam product to cure. Scrap from this foam product is reduced due to improved flow and processing characteristics.
“Finding a sustainable product that saves more than 5,000barrels of oil for every 300,000 Ford Focus models produced in North America is a very exciting solution for all of us,” said Joel Johnson, vice president, BASF Polyurethane Systems.
The American automaker plans to incorporate castor oil-based foam solutions across more products in the near future.
Other non-metal recycled and bio-based materials used in Ford vehicles so far include soy foam seat cushions and gaskets, wheat straw-filled storage bins, recycled resins for underbody systems, recycled yarns on seat covers and natural-fiber plastic for interior components.
In fact, Ford pioneered the use of soy-based foam in seats for the 2008 Ford Mustang and in headliners for the 2010 Ford Escape.