smart seals

Seals are increasingly being asked to do more than just seal. In the future, they should be able to forecast when they will break down and perform condition monitoring in real time – all on their own. As a technology specialist, Freudenberg Sealing Technologies is not just anticipating the steadily rising demands on seals but on future sealing materials as well. At Drinktec 2017 in Munich (Germany), the company presented a new generation of smart seals that is becoming possible for the food and process industries, thanks to a combination of various material characteristics.

Seals primarily consist of materials that cannot process signals in their pure form. That’s why Freudenberg Sealing Technologies’ material developers are investigating materials that seals can employ to become sensors or even actuators, for example, without impairing their original mission.