APPLICATION OF CHEMICAL ENGINEERING PRINCIPLES TO THE TASKS AND ACTIVITIES FOR INDUSTRIAL INTERNSHIP ACCREDITATION

1. Overview of the IMDS Department

International Material Data System (IMDS) Department is mainly responsible for Products Materials Content & Recyclability Reporting (PMCRR) of Lear Corporation. PMCRR, also known as IMDS reporting is a customer requirement enforced on suppliers as a result of legal requirements at different parts of the world.  Lear has to disclose content of every product shipped to customers before launch and with every Production Part Approval Process (PPAP). The Production Part Approval Process (PPAP) is used in the automotive supply chain to establish confidence in component suppliers and their production processes, by demonstrating that all customer engineering design record and specification requirements are properly understood by the supplier and that the process has the potential to produce product consistently meeting these requirements during an actual production run at the quoted production rate. Among the worldwide legal regulations that require reporting of material content of automotive parts are as follows:

European End of Life Vehicle (ELV) Directive : This regulation came into effect in European Union (EU) in September 2000.  Usage of lead, cadmium, mercury, and hexavalent chromium is prohibited except the applications listed in Annex II.  This regulation also requires cost free vehicle take back after end of life.

Annex II of ELV Directive: This document lists automotive applications that are currently exempt from using lead, cadmium, mercury, and hexavalent chromium.

Japanese Automobile Recycling Law : This law is similar to the ELV Directive in Europe, and was put in place in 2003.

Korean Electrical/Electronic Products and Automobiles Resource Recycling Law (Draft): This law is similar to the RoHS and ELV Directive in Europe.

Brominated Flame Retardants Prohibition Directive : A copy of EU Directive on prohibiting use of Penta- and Octa-PBDE in polymers.

Restriction of Hazardous Substance (RoHS) Directive : This is an EU Directive on the restriction of the use of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment

Waste from Electrical and Electronics Equipment (WEEE) Directive : A copy of EU Directive on waste electrical and electronic equipment

Service Parts/Spare Parts Directive: A copy of EU Directive on service or spare parts used on automotive application

PFOS Prohibition Directive : A copy of EU Directive on prohibiting the use of PFOS (Perfluorooctanate Sulfonates)

2. Process Flows of IMDS Reporting

Lear uses one reporting system worldwide which is shown in the figure below. Material data reporting revolves around the supplier chain as the material data report is provided by the supplying company and used by purchasing company until the total material data is reported to the end customer, which is the automotive manufacturer. The material data submitted by the suppliers, based on bill of materials (BOM) provided by Engineering team of all Lear plants are process by the IMDS Department for submission to customers. Until the IMDS submission is the approved and accepted by the customers, the PPAP package will not be accepted and the products manufactured by Lear plants cannot be shipped or delivered.

The flow material data processing of prior to submission to customers proceeds as shown in the figure below. The data submitted by the supplier is initially tracked in a database for submission status. The material data is then evaluated for presence of restricted and prohibited substance where these substances are tracked for recyclability and disposal information. The material data is then assessed if the restricted and prohibited substance content is within the threshold given by various worldwide legal regulations and compliant to customer specifications. The material data then undergoes validation if the material content reported follows the given reporting structure format or if the material content reported is reasonable according the actual part based on material science norms and customer specifications. After the validation of the material data from suppliers, these constructed into a material data tree based on bill of materials of the

IMDS Submissions

to Customers

SuppliersSubmissions of Material Data to

LearMaterial Data Processing

byLear Philippines

Engineeringand Technology

Center(PETC)

PPAP Submissions

to Customers via

IMDS

Engineering Team

ProvisionBill of

Materials

AdditionalInformation

to Customers

automotive parts. Recyclate information, summarized restricted substance content and disposal information are then provided before submission of the part to the customer.

3. Application of Chemical Engineering Principles to IMDS Reporting

In reporting of material data content of automotive parts through IMDS, Chemical Engineering knowledge is essential as most of the tasks involved requires background in general organic and organic chemistry, analytical chemistry, stoichiomety, material balance, material science disciplines like polymer science, and metallurgy. Environmental engineering concepts is also necessary on the assessment of aspect and impact of restricted and prohibited substances to the environment and their toxic effects to the environment.

Tracking material data submission deals with transferring of material data from global IMDS website to in-house Lear material compliance central. ChE skills applies the verification of acquired material data to the actual supplied product, in the initial investigation of these parts or products to its laboratory analysis information. There are also cases where ChE shills is required support both suppliers and Lear plant contacts to report to the IMDS website based on the laboratory analysis data and material safety data sheet (MSDS) of these products. In the evaluation of restricted and prohibited substances of the parts based on material data, ChE skills like material balance and stoichiometry is

Tracking of Material Data Submission

Evaluation of restricted and

prohibited substances per

material data

Assessment of restricted and

prohibited substances

content

Validation of material data

content

Construction of material data tree of Lear products

from supplier material data

Provision of recyclability and

disposal information for Lear products

applicable in the tracking of these substances and collating it under its main compounds family of the four heavy metals lead, mercury, cadmium and hexavalent chromium.

In the assessment of the restricted and prohibited substances, general knowledge of both inorganic and organic chemistry and material science is required to identify the specific substance content detail of the material data report with their respective percentage content and verify these based on existing restricted substance list of various legal regulations as enumerated in section 1. These restricted and prohibited substances have their respective threshold of varying allowable percentages for varying material classifications and product applications. In the validation of material data content, knowledge of material science disciplines like polymer science and metallurgy in the verification of the substances reported for raw materials of components and sub-assemblies. Knowledge of these material science disciplines is especially necessary in determining the structure of material data reports, the optimum and reliable disclosure of the substance content and the logical substance content reporting of the material data based on the material classification (e.g. polymer substance polyamide 66 should be reported under polyamide material and not under steel materials). Information for raw materials are also checked for accuracy like its material classification (e.g. butadiene rubber should be classified as elastomers and not as ceramics), material symbol (e.g. PBT, SBR) and material number (e.g. SAE 1010, ASTM 1910) based on global standards like International Organization for Standards (ISO), Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE), Automotive Industry Alliance Group (AIAG) and existing customer specifications.

In the construction of the material data tree based on provided bill of materials (BOM), similar ChE skills are required, with these time proper emphasis of material balance and stoichiometry as it is necessary that the materials enumerated in the (BOM) should be reported and with accurate information of its weight, usage, dimensions and quantity. It is also important that the substance content of these material data are compliant with respect to its restricted substance content and validated with proper material data structure. Similarly, additional validation of the material data is needed should there have been special requirements or waivers on the customer side. In providing the recyclability and disposal information of the material data tree, knowledge of environmental engineering is applicable in assessment of aspects and impacts of Lear products based on their material and substance content. Based on the material data report, the recyclate information of the part is estimated and the disposal information based on ELV guidelines is provided. Additional important information that are requested by the customers for reporting included presence of the 4 heavy metals (lead, mercury, cadmium and hexavalent chromium), flame retardants, polymeric fillers and impact modifiers, alloying elements for metals, material classification reports (e.g. plastics, steel, elastomer) and marking of polymeric parts (e.g. plastic, elastomer and textile), among others. Eventually, aside from legal and government compliance, both Lear and the customers will look upon these material data as considerations of the design for environment (DFE) of the automotive parts to design and produce parts that are environment-friendly, recyclable, can be reprocessed, and have less adverse impact to environment when disposed.