PRESENTATION                     

IMMG SA was established in June 1988 by four Ph.D. engineers previously engaged in advanced R&D in the field of Experimental Mechanics. Its premises, built on a hill-top of Mount Penteli consist of laboratories, a modern workshop equipped with CNC machines, a conference room and two levels of office space, covering a total area of 1100m 2 . The whole construction and its outstanding location combine a pleasant and modern working environment with carefully selected materials and industrial manufacturing specifications.

The activities of the company started with provision of services in mechanical testing of materials and structures and on the design, development and manufacture of high - precision mechanical parts, devices and machines for industrial or laboratory applications.

However in the last three years and following continuous involvement in the field of advanced reinforced thermoplastics, IMMG designed and patented the DIRIS isogrid core and panel, which is a commercial product exhibiting higher strength to weight ratios than commercially available honeycombs. Also the company has expanded its manufacturing infrastructure to cover the field of Carbon Nanotube (CNT) reinforced materials by developing and patenting a production method for aligning CNTs in polymer membranes to produce high performance nanocomposites.

The company started operation in 1990 with a staff of ten scientists and technicians and since then IMMG has successfully participated or coordinated more than thirty European and National industrial research projects. As a consequence IMMG has developed a leading testing laboratory where many new materials from more than forty large European Industries have been already examined. Moreover in 2002 the IMMG laboratory was selected to participate in the EU project “Transnational Access to Major Research Infrastructures”, where research infrastructures with unique research capabilities are funded to receive EU scientists to conduct state-of-the-art research.

IMMG S.A. has developed and validated through three running research projects a directionally reinforced, pre-stretched, single-yarn, isogrid core and panel from GFRP or CFRP thermoplastic material, exhibiting a much higher strength and stiffness to weight ratio than existing honeycombs from the same materials. Applications of the DIRIS core and panel (patent GR 1005771) include GFR-PEEK composite textile membrane connectors, textile cable termination and satellite structural elements for which the use of CFR-PEEK DIRIS core and panel is currently being investigated in a running research project with the European Space Agency (ESA)

IMMG S.A. has developed and patented (20080100037 patent pending) a novel production process for manufacturing CNT-thermoplastic nanocomposites. The process utilizes mild chemical treatments to functionalize the CNTs with polymeric matrix-specific molecular groups and pulsating electrical field purification to remove the amorphous carbon and also to straighten the noanotubes. The CNTs in the form of a steady suspension are laid on perforated thermoplastic membranes through a combined physical-electrical procedure in an aligned fashion. Further compaction, straightening and alignment are achieved through repeated rolling - streching - annealing cycles, which also have the benefit of strengthening the matrix material by many times its original strength. Resently, the use of microwaves as a potential localized heating method for the CNT nanocomposite is being investigated.

IMMG SA has developed and validated several new concepts:

i) specimen geometry which can develop a uniform shear field in the specimen,

ii) the concept of a piezo-electric actuation hydraulic servovalve

iii) the concept of high temperature biaxial testing of tubes by safe media generating internal pressure

iv) also several other concepts providing efficient control in high speed thermo-mechanical testing.

IMMG SA has won many international competitions, including several at CERN, Geneva for designing and manufacturing advanced components and testing machines. One such machine was the Pole Measuring Machine, a large 36m long 5 - axis robotic machine, able to test superconducting coils for the Large Hadron Collider.

IMMG SA has designed, manufactured and tested fiber structures (carbon, glass or natural fibers) for specific applications. An example is the dimensionally stable platforms (4 meters long each, carbon fibers in epoxy resin), manufactured for the CMS experiment, CERN and characterized by material procurement - machining perfection and exceptional assembly precision.

IMMG SA CAD – CAM capabilities, combined with 5 - axis CNC cutting machine centers and reverse engineering, allow design – production of complicated machine parts and devices. High precision engineering, assembly, electro-mechanical and opto-mechatronical inspection – testing in clean rooms are extensively employed. Defence projects, like the co-oproduction project for the Leopard II main battle tank (Hellenic and Spanish Arny), advance further the above capabilities.

IMMG SA has designed and validated piezo - electric actuators, capable to withstand large mechanical loading (50 KN) under long duration fatigue. In five European projects the degredation of mechanical – electrical parameters over long time loading was examined, modeled and finally predicted.

IMMG SA operates under a quality assurance system that includes both the laboratory and the industrial part of the company. This system has been certified to be in compliance with the ISO 9001: 2000 and the EN 45001 (ISO/IEC 17025) Quality Standard by the Greek National Council for Accreditation (ESYD).