Maximilian Hacker is 25 years old and the owner of BRComposites. He absolved his training as procedural mechanics of plastic and rubber technology, specialized in fibre composites.

 Activities previous to his self-employment:

1. Fischer & Entwicklung Landshut
2. Pilatus Aircraft Schweiz
3. Company with Formel 1 experience   (company name is not mentioned because of legal reasons)

CE: COMPOSITES EUROPE Team

MH: Maximilian Hacker

CE: Please introduce yourself. Who are you and what is your responsibility at BRComposites?

MH: BRComposites has exists for two years now. We are a young and very innovative company with a continuous strong growth. Furthermore, we think that  well-trained employees and to the original rules of craftsmanship are very important.

I am proud to say that we are already training employees. In my opinion there is still a lack of skilled workers in the composites industry.

We develop and offer individual production to our customers. Productions up to 10,000 standard parts are easily possible. In this way the volume of production is growing. Our production is done without autoclaves and everything is hand-made.

BRComposites

CE: So how did you experience the COMPOSITES EUROPE 2011 show? What are your impressions?

MH: This is the first time for BRComposites as an exhibitor at the COMPOSITES EUROPE. Actually we have been planning the first exhibition in 2016. At least that has been the conclusion of a family dinner. However, by coincidental, I got a phone call from the COMPOSITES EUROPE team the next day. During this conversation I received information about a funding possibility through BMWi. Because of the funding possibility and the sponsoring by Jost Chemicals, which is a close partner, we decided to book a booth for the COMPOSITES EUROPE 2011.

Mr. Hacker was reacting spontaneously when we asked him about his feelings as participant of the CE 2011. He was euphorically describing the exhibition as gigantic. The company had a huge success, a great number of good meetings and contacts. The booth was constantly busy because so many visitors were interested in their products. In his opinion, the exhibition service and the whole organisation was very commendable.

We closed the interview by talking about the presentation of innovations brought by BRC.

BRComposites presented flexible carbon protectors which is already used e.g. by the v. The jacket (have a look at the picture) in the background is specially made for extreme mountainbikers and is equipped with flexible carbon protectors. All visitors have been wondering what kind of material this is. However, we could not get any detailed information.

Thank you so much for the interesting and open conversation with Mr. Hacker.

The Iltis09, which is the vehicle’s name, is a single-seated racer developed and constructed by the Bodensee Racing Team (BRT). This team is comprised of students from different departments of the University of Constance (HTWG), namely technology, business and design – and Harke Chemicals supports those ambitioned young academics as sponsor.
Each year the team of students develops and constructs a new and improved Iltis. For up to twelve months the young professionals focus their thoughts on areas like design and construction. Moreover, they develop amongst others a business plan and, thus they accompany the project from a business studies perspective as well.
As there are numerous highlights regarding construction and performance there can be mentioned just a few exemplary ones: acceleration from 0 to 100 km/h in 3.6 seconds, 599 cubic centimeters of displacement, 63 kW performance at the rear wheels, anti-torsion steel tube spaceframe construction, vacuum-cured and hand-laminated carbon fiber body panels, launch control system, double piston
brake calipers with floating brake discs, energy-absorbing foam crashbox or Ethafoam head restraints.
The Iltis has already proved its powers in many Formula Student races. The latter is a competition during which students from all over the world compete with each other in their self-constructed racers.
The ultra light-weight but also extremely stable chassis of the Iltis is a spectacular example of just one of the manifold fields of usage of modern epoxy resins. Apart from those resins the product portfolio of Harke Chemicals also contains diluents, hardeners and additives, which can be individually tailored according to the customers’ needs.

Booth Harke Chemicals: Hall 10 – 11 / booth no D21

The “Formula1” of the student world takes place in different countries. In this year the BRT participate in Formula Student Races in Austria, Hungary and Italy with its ‘Iltis10’, which is the name of the racing car. The team has put an entire year’s passion and sweat into this car. To start with there was the designprocess, further the physical construction, then the testing – everything was realized by the students on their own. Racing is a costly affair, therefore the teams depend on the support of the economy. This year Harke Chemicals sponsors the team of 54 members with epoxy resins of their supply program, which are used to build the covering of the racing car in weight-saving construction in order to improve the speed.

So the fibre-glass frame of the covering was laminated and cured at room temperature in a vacuum process. The approach is called RIM technique (Resin Infusion Molding) or, in general, infusion technique. The principle is to inject liquid resin of low viscosity (under 500 mPas) at low pressure in only one working process into the mold, which is filled with reinforcing agents as for instance glass-fibre. Thereby the mold is covered with a flexible membrane and is thus used as a counterblock. Simultaneously the resin is pressed into the mold at low pressure. Through this procedure the epoxy resin can disperse among the reinforcing agents in an optimal way and cure in the mold by beeing heated afterwards.

The Bodensee Racing Team has constructed a racing car and organized a racing team for the 5th time already – always aiming at improving their results of the previous year. Students of different disciplines like engineering, economy and art at Konstanz University are the team members, which is a perfect precondition for this interdisciplinary task. The competition isn’t only about being the fastest car on the road but about being top in the overall standings. There are two disciplines. One discipline evaluates the static performance, like the presentation of the business plan, the design, the construction and the cost optimization of the components. The other one is the dynamic discipline. Here the focus is on acceleration, speed, brake ability, bank, reliability, dynamics and fuel economy. A jury of experts in motorsports, the automotive industry and its suppliers evaluate every racing car in the different disciplines. If everything goes well the BRT can improve last years results. And because of the fact that cool-down after one is the warm-up for the next race, the Bodensee Racing Team can expect support of Harke Chemicals next year.

Dates:
Formula Student Austria (11.08.-14.08.2010)
Formula Student Hungary (19.08.-22.8.2010)
Formula Student Italy (03.09.-06.09.2010)

Information on the company
Harke Chemicals GmbH has supplied chemicals for different applications for almost 45 years and has built up a comprehensive expertise in this field. The diversified portfolio ranges from, amongst others, basic chemicals, further pure chemicals for the electronic industry up to customized epoxy resin systems. The Managing Director of Harke Chemicals is Dirk Forler. The company belongs to the Harke Group, which – as an internationally acting marketer and distributor – opens industrial sales and supply markets for their customers and suppliers in the fields of chemicals, plastics, pharma and food in Europe and worldwide. Moreover, the group of companies offers affiliated services like e.g. contract packing, contract manufacturing and business-specific legal advice. Founded in 1965 as SYNTANA Handelsgesellschaft E. Harke GmbH & Co. KG, the trading house has expanded to a worldwide-acting group of companies, as a result of its steady growth and its consistent development of their business segments. Today HARKE Group has a turnover of 80 Mio. Euros and 140 employees. Thorsten Harke has been leading the family business in second generation for nearly 20 years today.

Source of supply:
HARKE Composites BU of HARKE Chemicals GmbH, Xantener Straße 1,
45479 Mülheim an der Ruhr, Germany, phone +49 (0) 208/3069-0, fax +49 (0) 208/3069-1111, e-mail: composites@harke.com, website: www.harke.com/composites

PR contact HARKE Group:
Simone Drott, HARKE Services GmbH, Xantener Straße 1, 45479 Mülheim an der Ruhr, Germany, phone +49 (0) 208/3069-2570, e-mail: sdr@harke.com

Website Bodensee Racing Team: www.brt-konstanz.de

The stick was used by the Swiss Team at the Hockey World Championship 2009 and was also praised by the Russian, Austrian, Latvian and French teams.  The new, patented nanotechnology provides the hockey stick with its specific strength and thus improves its impact characteristics as well as its reaction where bending, resistance and torsion are concerned.  In addition, the energy released by the player is passed directly and efficiently to the puck due to the one-piece design.

One of these is Saertex GmbH & Co. KG from Saerbeck.  The company produces so-called non-crimp multi-ply fabrics.  These are characterized by stretched fibres within the individual plies, which optimally absorb mechanical forces such as pressure and tension.  Different mechanical strengths can be achieved by the fibre used, weight per unit area and angle combination.  Multi-axial multi-ply fabrics have been specially developed for the requirements of the sports industry and are used, in particular, in skis and snowboards.