UniSA senior researcher Dr Colin Hall wins 2016 Prime Minister’s Science Prize for New Innovators
LOOKING at an industrial problem with new eyes and turning the conventional approach “on its head” enabled production of the world’s first plastic car mirror and countless future products. SEE THE VIDEO
READ BELOW: PRIME MINISTER’S PRIZE WINNERS
LOOKING at an industrial problem with new eyes and turning the conventional approach “on its head” enabled production of the world’s first plastic car mirror and countless future products.
UniSA senior researcher Dr Colin Hall has won the 2016 Prime Minister’s Science Prize for New Innovators for bringing plastic mirrors “up to scratch”, creating new jobs and exports.
But Dr Hall says he can’t take all the credit, the multi-million dollar export success was a team effort between UniSA and SMR Automotive.
The plastic mirror is only half the weight of a conventional glass mirror — less body weight achieves lower fuel consumption, and less emissions. And being plastic, the mirror is safer because it doesn’t shatter in a crash like glass.
“I got this prize because it was my idea, the way that the coating was developed, and the technology, was based on a concept I came up with,” he said.
“Then the group and everyone worked around that, as a team we made it work.”
He used his experience of nine years research with SOLA Optical, the Adelaide-founded company that pioneered the replacement of glass in spectacles, to fix the car parts problem.
“I looked at what people had tried to do before and their plastic mirrors were failing tests and just weren’t up to scratch,” Dr Hall said.
“So I went back to what I’d known worked in the past (with plastic lenses) and tried to apply it to this application — and it worked.”
He said he “flipped” the conventional approach and “turned it on its head”.
“Previously most people would have a plastic, they’d put a metal layer down to be a mirror, then you’d put a protective clear coating over the top,” he said. “That sounds logical and most people went down that path but what you find is the metal doesn’t really stick to the plastic and you’ve got this clear transparent layer that has to be UV resistant and abrasion resistant and that’s really hard to do.
“So I flipped it around, the other way around, I put the protective layer on first, then I put the metal layer on top, then we spent time working out the other layers to make the metal robust enough.”
In 2012, Ford made the SMR plastic convex spotter mirror standard in F350 and F250 trucks. Other manufacturers are assessing the technology.
To date, the Adelaide-made mirrors have earned $160 million in exports.
The team is looking at other applications where plastic can replace glass and metal, making aircraft, spacecraft and even whitegoods lighter and more efficient.
PRIME MINISTER’S PRIZE WINNERS
• PM’s Prize for Science: Rick Shine, The University of Sydney, helping Northern Australia’s peak predators — snakes and lizards — survive the cane-toad invasion.
• PM’s Prize for Innovation: Michael Aitken, Capital Markets CRC, applying rapid analysis of markets and systems for fraud detection to Australia’s health markets.
• PM’s Prize for New Innovators: Colin Hall, University of South Australia, his world first plastic car mirrors are the beginning of a new manufacturing technology, and jobs.
• PM’s Prize for Excellence in Science Teaching in Secondary Schools: Suzy Urbaniak, Kent Street Senior High School, Perth, turning students on to geoscience.
• PM’s Prize for Excellence in Science Teaching in Primary Schools: Gary Tilley, Seaforth Public School, Sydney, bringing science into the next generation of primary school classrooms.
• Malcolm McIntosh Prize for Physical Scientist of the Year: Richard Payne, The University of Sydney, re-engineering proteins from nature to fight TB, malaria, stroke, and cancer.
• Frank Fenner Prize for Life Scientist of the Year: Kerrie Wilson, University of Queensland, using economics and maths to protect tropical forests and guide bush renewal.