In Denmark, a boat manufacturer has designed and build a boat that is 80% renewable.
Friedrich Johann Deimann, founder of GreenBoats, tells Composites Manufacturing that he sought alternatives for fiberglass and styrene-based polyester resins. The GreenBente24 boat uses flax fibers to impart stiffness and impact and abrasion resistance into a biocomposite material. Cork provides lightness and water resistance. GreenBente24 is 80% renewable, he adds. “The products have a really nice haptic in the end,” Deimann adds.
There are tradeoffs, however. The strength and stiffness of the flax-based composite is slightly less than glass fiber laminates, but the boat weighs about 100 less than a comparable boat. The vessel is also about 20% more expensive.
Demand has nonetheless been good. “The first customers are already sailing happily on German seas and lakes,” says Deimann. GreenBoats was among the innovation award winners at the recent European Conference on Wood and Natural Fiber Composites.