A Windsor company's technological knowhow is at the "heart" of a new multimillion-dollar research centre aimed at developing lightweight materials for the North American auto industry.

Dieffenbacher North America Inc. is building a hydraulic press that will be housed in the Fraunhofer Project Center for Composites Research @ Western, which will be located in London.

"We're the major equipment supplier for the centre, providing the 2,500-ton press," said Colin Folco, general manager at Dieffenbacher, which manufactures hydraulic presses for such sectors as automotive and the wood industry. "The press is the heart of the centre."

The centre is a joint project between the University of Western Ontario and Germany-based Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology ICT, which is considered a world leader in material and process research and development work for the lightweight sector, said Ted Hewitt, Western's vice-president of research and research international relations. The City of London contributed $10 million to the centre, which is slated to open its doors next July.

It will focus on the development of lightweight materials to be used by auto parts manufacturers and others in industry that produce structural components from composite material that can significantly decrease product weight.

"As this new technology starts to take root, companies will start to replace steel and metal with these lightweight composites which have a huge advantage in so far as they're lighter, they can be made more quickly, they're cheaper and they're strong," said Hewitt. "Lightweight composite materials are not only silicon fibre, but hemp, glass, carbon and other natural products as well.

"It's technology which is key here and unique technology which Fraunhofer society is bringing to Canada, which will provide tremendous benefit not just to auto parts suppliers, but a number of other players in the manufacturing sector in the region and throughout the Midwestern U.S."

Faced with increasingly stringent fuel efficiency standards, automakers are eager to wean their dependency off of steel and metal.

Industrial hydraulic presses manufactured by Dieffenbacher are used by automakers to process composite materials, such as carbon and glass fibres, into exterior and interior auto parts, said Folco.

The new centre will act as a testing ground for partnering companies, which also include Ford, General Motors and Toyota, said Hewitt.

"If I'm a manufacturer of bumpers and I'm using plastic technology, I can move to a lightweight material," said Hewitt. "If I'm using metal I can go to the facility and I can mould and produce my new part in small quantities and I can test its use and application for which it's intended and then adapt the technology within my own operation and buy the equipment to do that."

Frank Henning, director of the Fraunhofer Project Center, said Dieffenbacher, whose parent company is headquartered in Germany, was one of the driving forces behind the new centre.

"It's too complicated to send heavy moulds overseas," said Henning. "We need something which is right on their soil in North America, where people can use North American materials and can be faster in innovations."

Henning said composite materials are already found in a variety of automotive parts and process, including frontend assembly carriers, underbody shields, upper beams carriers, seat shells, spare wheel wells, tailgates and roof modules. He noted that BMW is currently working on a carbon-enriched body.

"These technologies are at the edge of being transferred into industrial applications," Henning said. "We'll see more parts on the market in the next two to three years."