June 2018

42 43 AMERICAN COMPOSITES MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION T he American Composites Manu- facturers Association (ACMA) is the world’s largest trade association serving the composites industry. Its mission is to provide education and informa- tion to the industry, lobby for its members and affiliates, and develop and expand mar- kets for the manufacturers and distributors of composite products. A composite material is any material made AMERICAN COMPOSITES MANUFACTURERS ASSOCIATION from two or more constituent materials with significantly different physical or chemical properties that,when combined, produce a material with characteristics differ- ent from the individual components.The new material may be preferred for many reasons: common examples include materials which are stronger, lighter, or less expensive when compared to traditional materials. The earliest man-made composite mate- rials were straw and mud, which were com- bined to form bricks for building construc- tion in the ancient world. Concrete is also a composite material, made of aggregate A VOICE FOR THE INDUSTRY