
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, June 29, 1995                   TAG: 9506290050
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B-8   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: GREG EDWARDS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

VINTON PLANT HELPS DEVELOP NEW FORWARD-LOOKING AIR BAG

Precision Fabrics Group Inc. has developed a new type of air bag from material made at its Vinton plant that could open a broad new market for the company, considering that automakers worldwide are expected to need 40 million of the devices per year by 1997.

Precision Fabrics and Sandia National Laboratories, a U.S. Department of Energy lab, collaborated on the design of the air bag. It inflates to the same size as those now used, but before inflation it is only 40 percent as large and heavy.

When the new air bag is folded, it will fit in a shirt pocket. But it provides the same protection as other units, which take up about the same space as two stacked videotapes, the company said.

Precision Fabrics holds exclusive rights to the design. It plans to make the air bags and sell components to automotive suppliers.

Ali Khan, manager of the Vinton plant, said it will start producing the material without adding employees, space or equipment. However, the company expects to increase manufacturing capacity eventually as demand for the air bags increases, he said.

Rich Bliton, a spokesman for Greensboro, N.C.-based Precision Fabrics, said the company plans to launch commercial production of the air bags for the 1998 automotive model year in September 1997. That means the plant would start weaving the nylon fabric in the fall of 1996, he said.

Before Tuesday, when the air bag was unveiled, Precision Fabrics had talked primarily with other air bag makers about the new design. Since then, however, the company has received calls from automakers who are interested in evaluating the device, Bliton said.

Beginning in 1997, the federal government will require that all automobiles sold in the United States be equipped with air bags for both the driver and front-seat passenger.

Precision Fabric's new design will allow automakers to build more air bags into such additional areas as seats and door panels, said Lanty Smith, the company's chief executive. "Achieving such added protection is difficult with current, bulky designs," he said.

The air bags will be assembled at Precision's plant in Greensboro, N.C. The company, formed in 1988, had been part of Burlington Industries. It now has 1,300 employees and operates a third plant in Jamestown, N.C.

Precision's Vinton plant makes material for computer and typewriter ribbons and other industrial fabrics. The company also is the world's leading supplier of military-aviator parachute fabrics.

Sandia researchers have worked for 40 years in the development of lightweight, high-performance parachutes for the Defense Department, including the first supersonic parachutes used in nuclear weapons.

The new design was developed with the help of computers and structural analysis techniques that Sandia normally uses in parachute design. The air bags were tested at Sandia's facilities in California and New Mexico as well as at industrial test facilities.

by CNB