Thermoplastics have revolutionized modern industries with their adaptability, durability, and wide range of applications. These versatile polymers offer engineers and designers materials that can be molded and reshaped repeatedly without altering their chemical properties.
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Piedmont Plastics supplies various thermoplastic materials for countless applications across the construction, automotive, medical, and consumer goods sectors. Understanding the technical aspects of thermoplastics will help you make informed decisions about material selection for your specific needs.
With over 100 years of combined product knowledge and industry experience, we are confident our plastics experts can help you find a solution for your application.
Thermoplastics are polymers that become pliable or moldable at elevated temperatures and harden upon cooling. This heating and cooling cycle can be repeated multiple times without changing the material’s chemical structure, making thermoplastics unique for their recyclability and versatility.
Thermoplastics' molecular structure— chains of repeating units held together by weak intermolecular forces—enables them to be reshaped and reused. Unlike thermosetting plastics (thermosets), which cannot be remolded after the curing process, thermoplastics can be repeatedly melted and reformed, making them an ideal choice for sustainable manufacturing.
At Piedmont Plastics, we offer a wide selection of thermoplastics, each with specific properties tailored to different industries. Here are some of the key thermoplastic materials available:
Polycarbonate is a high-performance thermoplastic known for its exceptional impact resistance, optical clarity, and heat resistance. Its ability to withstand extreme conditions makes it ideal for safety shields, automotive headlamp lenses, greenhouse panels, and industrial machinery guards. Polycarbonate's ability to maintain structural integrity in both low and high temperatures makes it a favored material in demanding environments.
Technical Specs Impact resistance: 250 times stronger than glass Heat resistance: Usable up to 135°C (275°F) Recyclability: Polycarbonate is recyclable, but it requires careful sorting to remove additives like UV stabilizers.ABS is known for its toughness, lightweight properties, and ease of processing. It is widely used in automotive components, electronics housings, and consumer products due to its excellent impact resistance and dimensional stability. ABS can withstand mechanical stress without cracking or breaking, making it ideal for structural applications.
Technical Specs Tensile strength: 40 MPa (Megapascal) Heat deflection temperature: 90-100°C Impact strength: Moderately high, ideal for automotive interiors and consumer electronicsAcrylic, known as polymethyl methacrylate, is a transparent thermoplastic with superior optical clarity. It is often used as a lightweight, shatter-resistant alternative to glass in applications like windows, displays, aquariums, and signage. Acrylic is UV-resistant and retains its clarity over time, making it suitable for outdoor applications.
Technical Specs Light transmittance: 92%, which exceeds that of glass Impact resistance: 10 times stronger than glass, though less durable than polycarbonate Weather resistance: Acrylic is highly resistant to yellowing and maintains clarity under prolonged UV exposure.PETG combines the durability of PET with the flexibility and easy processing of glycol modification. It is commonly used in medical packaging, food containers, and 3D printing applications. PETG is FDA-approved for food contact and is resistant to many chemicals, making it a preferred material for medical devices and consumer packaging.
Technical Specs Chemical resistance: Resistant to alcohols, acids, and diluted bases Heat resistance: Up to 70°C (158°F) Impact resistance: Higher than acrylic but lower than polycarbonate, suitable for moderate-load applicationsNylon is valued for its toughness, flexibility, and excellent abrasion resistance. It is commonly used in automotive components, mechanical gears, and textiles. Nylon’s ability to absorb impact and resist wear makes it ideal for high mechanical strength applications.
Technical Specs Tensile strength: Up to 85 MPa Heat deflection temperature: Up to 180°C (356°F) in certain grades Abrasion resistance: Extremely high, ideal for gears, bearings, and high-wear componentsThermoplastics provide a range of benefits that make them suitable for various industries.
The ability to be reshaped and reused multiple times without losing mechanical properties makes thermoplastics an environmentally friendly choice. Many thermoplastics, such as PETG and polycarbonate, can be recycled, reducing material waste and supporting sustainable manufacturing practices.
Many thermoplastics, including polycarbonate and ABS, offer high impact resistance, making them ideal for applications requiring toughness and durability. Polycarbonate, for example, is 250 times stronger than glass, which makes it an excellent choice for safety applications.
Thermoplastics can be molded into complex geometries, allowing creative design freedom. This particularly benefits automotive and consumer goods industries, where lightweight, durable, and intricately shaped components are necessary.
Thermoplastics are well-suited for high-volume, low-cost manufacturing processes, including injection molding and extrusion. This efficiency helps lower production costs while maintaining excellent precision in part fabrication.
However, there are also limitations to thermoplastics:
While thermoplastics like polycarbonate offer excellent heat resistance, others may soften or deform at lower temperatures, limiting their use in high-temperature applications. PETG, for instance, begins to lose structural integrity above 70°C.
Prolonged exposure to UV light can cause certain thermoplastics, such as polycarbonate, to turn yellow or become brittle over time, though UV-resistant coatings can mitigate this issue.
Some thermoplastics are more resistant to chemicals than others. Polycarbonate can be degraded by exposure to certain solvents, while PETG and acrylic offer better chemical resistance.
Thermoplastics offer many properties that make them essential materials in today’s industries. Thermoplastics provide the versatility and performance necessary to meet these demands, whether you need high-impact resistance, chemical stability, or optical clarity. From construction to automotive and electronics, our team of experts is ready to help you choose the right thermoplastic for your application.
Combining the versatility and flexibility of thermoplastics with advanced manufacturing methods makes them an innovative solution for virtually every imaginable industry. However, the manufacturing and development process involves many challenges, and each of these steps requires special expertise and technology.
Contact us to discuss your requirements of thermoplastic compounds. Our experienced sales team can help you identify the options that best suit your needs.
From careful material selection to precise testing practices, here are some of the capabilities that go into a successful thermoplastic project. As we’ll cover below, these are just some of the factors that a vertically integrated provider can house under a single roof, allowing OEMs to streamline projects.
The thermoplastic family of materials is vast and ever-expanding. However, not every thermoplastic material is a high-performance polymer – that is, not all of these thermoplastics can meet the demands of high temperatures and high stress or other site-specific conditions.
The following is an overview of some of the most common injection-molded thermoplastics, as well as how they stack up to PEEK – a high-performance material that can handle more challenging conditions than its counterparts.
The most common plastic material in the world, polyethylene is known for its simple chemical structure. It comes in a number of forms, each of which is used for a variety of applications.
Low-density polyethylene (LDPE) has good flexibility, elongation, impact strength, and transparency. You’ve probably most recently interacted with this material in the form of a plastic grocery bag, but it’s also used for making plastic bottles and other packaging products.
High-density polyethylene (HDPE) has a high melting point, rigidity, hardness, and strength, as well as low water absorption, outstanding electrical properties, and good radiation resistance.
Its corrosion resistance and insulating properties make it a popular source material for 3D printing filaments, as well as a durable option for pipes, toys, and plastic furniture.
Finally, ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene has high impact strength, fatigue resistance, and wear resistance. It is effective in the manufacturing of anti-friction, wear-resistant, and transmission parts, making it especially valuable for the automotive and marine industries.
You’ve probably heard of Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) due to its common use in various types of pipe. However, PVC has come to replace a much wider variety of traditional building materials, such as wood, metal, concrete, rubber, ceramics, and more.
PVC materials include rigid PVC (RPVC) and semi-rigid (SRPVC) varieties. RPVC properties include high mechanical strength, excellent electrical performance, strong acid and alkali resistance, good chemical stability, but a low softening point. These qualities make RPVC suitable for manufacturing rod, pipe, plate, oil pipe, and acid-resistant parts.
On the other hand, SRPVC properties include a higher elongation rate, lower mechanical strength, better corrosion resistance, and greater electrical insulation than SRPVC. While SRPVC is more prone to aging and decomposition than its rigid counterpart, it’s suitable for making thin sheets, thin film, wire and cable insulation, sealing parts, and more.
Polyamide, more commonly known as nylon, is another extremely common thermoplastic material. It is tough, wear resistant, fatigue resistant, oil resistant, water resistant, and mold resistant. Some polyamides have considerable elasticity, high-impact strength, and high water absorption. Others offer exceptional abrasion resistance, while still others are translucent and offer better cold resistance.
These properties render nylon and its derivatives a suitable material for a variety of components, including general mechanical parts, anti-friction parts, driving parts, and chemical electrical instrument parts.
All of these properties add up to the ability to complete a broader range of projects at a faster rate – all with safer, more durable results.
Some of the standard manufacturing processes engineers use to develop high-quality parts include molding, milling, extrusion, pultrusion, machining, welding, and grinding. These methods can produce a variety of stock shapes, such as billets, rods, sheets, films, pipes, and tubes, which are readily available for secondary operations.
In the right hands, a vertically integrated manufacturer can transform thermoplastics into custom-engineered products designed for precision, intricacy, and consistency.
Injection molding is particularly effective in producing high-performance thermoplastic components that meet rigorous mechanical requirements. In this process, machines inject molten polymer materials under high pressure and at high speed into closed molds. This process is appropriate for both high- and low-volume production.
Injection molding not only enables manufacturers to produce high-quality components with an exceptional degree of consistency and efficiency, it also allows them to create custom solutions for specific field conditions. To take a deep dive on the advantages of injection molding, read our blog post on this topic.
Additives play a significant role in the processing and fabrication of thermoplastics, allowing providers to customize materials to meet rigorous technical standards, such as those related to strength, rigidity, and melting point.
The five primary types of additives for thermoplastics, along with their primary uses, are:
Each of these properties allows providers to optimize thermoplastic materials for physical, mechanical, electrical, and optical specifications. Along with the manufacturing method and raw material supply, these specifications are an important factor in selecting the right thermoplastic for a specific application.
Various testing processes are involved in the development of thermoplastics. Testing is important not only for creating safe, compliant components but also for ensuring that the material will meet the specific requirements of the environment.
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