German speciality chemicals company Evonik (Essen; www.evonik.com) has created a base polymer as a substitute for metal in classic applications such as highly filled moulding compounds. "Vestamid" HTplus is a semi-crystalline material based on polyphthalamide (PPA) that Evonik said has stable mechanical properties at sustained high temperatures, good chemical resistance and is simple to process.

The base polymer has a glass transition temperature of 155 °C and can withstand mechanical stress up to 135 °C . The company noted that while the modulus of elasticity of a standard product falls by approximately 80% at 120 °C, the decrease for Vestamid HTplus is only 15%.