The saying, “If you wait long enough, it will come back in style”, certainly applies to aliphatic polyketone (PK). More than 13 years ago, Shell halted the production of "Carilon" and, having failed to find a buyer for the patent, donated it to the US research institute SRI International (Menlo Park, California; www.sri.com) – see Plasteurope.com of 05.07.2002. The material is now back on the market and is produced under the "Karilon" brand by South Korean industrial conglomerate Hyosung (Seoul; www.hyosung.com). The capacity of the production plant has not been disclosed.

German Akro-Plastic (Niederzissen / Germany; www.akro-plastic.com) is among the few European compounders to work with the resurrected material. One of the first available types is "Akrotek" PK with a 50% glass fibre content.

"Aliphatic polyketones have a number of interesting properties that no other polymer can offer in this combination," said a company spokesman. They include outstanding hydrolysis resistance, high barrier properties against fuel and oxygen, minimal wear and tear with homogeneous mating and extremely high resilience. A single-layer fuel line made of this material is claimed to have a higher barrier effect against fuel than a multi-layer line of PA 12 and PVDF.