{"id":53449,"date":"2026-04-20T09:34:17","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T07:34:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/?p=53449"},"modified":"2026-04-20T10:00:56","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T08:00:56","slug":"hybrid-lightweight-sustainable-and-exceptionally-safe-headrest-for-car-child-seat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/hybrid-lightweight-sustainable-and-exceptionally-safe-headrest-for-car-child-seat\/","title":{"rendered":"Hybrid, lightweight, sustainable, and exceptionally safe headrest for car child seat"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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If all child seat headrests were produced using lightweight technologies, a substantial reduction in carbon emissions could be achieved across the automotive and transport sectors. By replacing virgin PA6 with 100 % recycled feedstock reinforced with unidirectional tapes, manufacturers can significantly reduce CO\u2082 emissions while maintaining or even improving mechanical performance.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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This manufacturing approach delivers a key benefit of up to a 34 % reduction in CO\u2082 footprint compared to a headrest made from virgin PA6, together with a 20 % weight reduction versus conventional injection-molded parts. Importantly, the lightweight solution maintains the same level of impact energy absorption as the virgin material, ensuring uncompromised safety.<\/p>

Additional advantages include the use of recycled marine waste and the implementation of circular design principles for safety-critical components, strengthening both environmental responsibility and longterm sustainability.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Headrest (\u00a9 LSE)<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Child seat with headrest (\u00a9 LSE)<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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Project content <\/strong><\/p>

The hybrid composite child seat headrest represents a breakthrough in sustainable lightweight design. It combines mechanically recycled polyamide 6 (PA6) with advanced unidirectional (UD) tape laminates to achieve outstanding impact performance in a safety-critical application. This innovation demonstrates that high-performance safety components can successfully integrate mechanically recycled materials without compromising safety.\u00a0<\/p>

Manufactured using an efficient single-step hybrid molding process, the UD tape insert is thermoformed and directly back-injected with post-consumer recycled PA6, integrating the support structure for both headrest and backrest. This enables a lean, cost-effective, and scalable production route for sustainable safety components.<\/p>

Discarded fishing nets collected in Africa (by the Sea2see Foundation) are used, reducing ocean waste and its negative impact on marine life. Plus, it will add more value creation.\u00a0<\/p>

Evaluation<\/strong><\/p>

The project also demonstrates how interdisciplinary collaboration along the entire value chain can lead to innovative, sustainable solutions for safety-critical applications. Material development process integration, component design, and environmental impact assessment were considered holistically and successfully implemented in a functional demonstrator.<\/p>

By combining recycled polymers with composite technology, new application fields for post-consumer recycled plastics are unlocked. The main value lies in achieving a 34 % CO\u2082 reduction and 20 % mass reduction compared to a conventional virgin PA6 headrest, without any loss in impact energy absorption.<\/p>

So the project demonstrates that sustainability, safety, and lightweight construction are compatible with one another. The result is a scalable pathway toward circular, lightweight, and sustainable design across industries.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Child seat with headrest (\u00a9 LSE)<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Developed within the EU-funded RaRe\u00b2 project (www.raresquare.eu). Extensive crash testing confirmed equal energy absorption compared to virgin material.<\/p>

Project partners:<\/strong> thermoPre Engineering GmbH; LSE GmbH; Avionaut \u2013 L. Karwala sp. k.; Chemnitz University of Technology \u2013 Institute of Lightweight Structures; DOMO Engineering Plastics Europe S.p.A. Germany; Innovation Cluster Circular Saxony \u2013 represented by Circular MTC e.V.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Contact:<\/strong><\/p>

thermoPre ENGINEERING GmbH,
Sebastian Iwan, CEO
+49 176 20 74 23 28
sebastian.iwan@thermopre-gmbh.de<\/a>
thermopre-engineering.de<\/a><\/p>

\u00a0<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If all child seat headrests were produced using lightweight technologies, a substantial reduction in carbon emissions could be achieved across the automotive and transport sectors. By replacing virgin PA6 with 100 % recycled feedstock reinforced with unidirectional tapes, manufacturers can significantly reduce CO\u2082 emissions while maintaining or even improving mechanical performance.\u00a0 This manufacturing approach delivers […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":53442,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,171],"tags":[],"main-cat":[144,34],"bildung":[],"forschungs-cat":[],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53449"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53449"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53449\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53455,"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53449\/revisions\/53455"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53449"},{"taxonomy":"maincategory","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/main-cat?post=53449"},{"taxonomy":"bildung","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bildung?post=53449"},{"taxonomy":"forschung","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/composites-united.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/forschungs-cat?post=53449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}