Bayblend®, Makrolon®

Flat TV with a glowing aura

Better fire protection for TV housings with high-quality, flame-retardant thermoplastics

The new plasma FlatTVTM from Philips with its 42-inch screen promises to make watching television a comfortable and relaxing experience with pin-sharp images and enhanced room lighting. The secret of its success is AmbilightTM, an innovative lighting concept that enhances the TV and the viewing environment itself by projecting background lighting built into the rear of the TV onto the wall behind the set. This creates a more relaxing viewing experience and blends the TV perfectly into the living room décor. Also the picture quality is better perceived in terms of contrast, colors and detail. To make this feature possible, the housing had to be redesigned by integrating a transparent intermediate frame between the back and front covers. Dubbed "Tech Cabinet 422", the frame allows light to pass through thanks to the material it's made of: Makrolon® 6555, a polycarbonate from Bayer MaterialScience AG.
"Using polycarbonate to build television housings is a new trend. Our material won out for this application because it boasts excellent flame-retardancy while simultaneously offering very high transparency and heat resistance," explains Melanie-Isabel Stephan, key account manager at Bayer MaterialScience. The material satisfies the stringent US test standard UL 94 V (Underwriters Laboratories) for a specimen three millimeters thick, obtaining the highest classification, V-0.
Because Philips has particularly rigorous fire protection requirements, the front and back covers of various other Philips television sets are made of Bayblend® FR 2010, another engineering thermoplastic from Bayer MaterialScience. "This material is a PC/ABS blend with flame-retardant additives containing no antimony, bromine or chlorine. It likewise has a UL listing of V-0 (at 1.5 millimeters). Moreover, it offers outstanding flow characteristics and heat resistance," Stephan says.