Performance Plastics celebrated its 40th anniversary on Wednesday, December 14th, 2022.
It was a fun day, including lunch for the staff and a birthday cake. A special shout out to the greater Cincinnati community, and congressman Brad Wenstrup’s office for helping to make our day even more memorable.
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Sustainable aviation maintenance is a multi-disciplinary objective that seeks solutions to improve the environmental and societal impacts of air transportation.
Maintenance activities have environmental impacts including the production of waste and disposal of end-of-life parts. According to aviation experts, aircraft maintenance is of significant environmental impact and cannot be neglected. Corporate responsibility forces aircraft manufacturers and maintainers to take into account these impacts and develop some solutions to minimize the environmental impacts of the maintenance phase.
Maintenance professionals highlight the importance of safety and reliability in developing maintenance tasks and cycles. Manufacturers need to source efficient and practical solutions to meet the requirements of safety and reliability. But at the same time, the need to minimize life cycle costs while preventing or limiting harmful impacts to the environment. This goal can be achieved by defining objectives including making longer-life parts, utilizing reusable tools, and limiting harmful impacts on the environment during maintenance.
EnduroSharp® is a line of products used to repair and maintain aircraft structures that are reusable and resharpenable. The product line consists of non-metallic material removal tools that will not damage aircraft during the process of removing sealants, adhesives, and coatings. The EnduroSharp® nonmarring aircraft maintenance tools are made from Torlon®, a high-performance plastic that creates a durable tool that will hold a superior edge. Creating an effective tool for aircraft maintainers, that will not damage aircraft structures, like aluminum and composite allows your aircraft structures to last longer.
For more information on our EnduroSharp® Product Line contact Rich Reed, Vice President of Sales and Marketing, at (513) 321-8404 or [email protected].
A fluoropolymer is one of the growing numbers fluorocarbon-based polymers. They are widely used in healthcare applications due to their biocompatibility, lubricity, sterilizability, chemical inertness, thermal stability, barrier properties, and high purity. However, when compared with other resins, they are significantly more expensive and require special techniques to injection mold due to their shear sensitivity, high melt temperatures, and fluorine outgassing when melted.
Although the best-known fluoropolymer, polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE or Teflon®), has been on the market since the 1940s, newer resins have been developed to address specific injection molding niches. Perfluoroalkoxy polymer (PFA) and fluorinated ethylene-propylene (FEP plastic) are among the most recent additions to the list of fluoropolymer options.
PFA was developed in order to create a true melt-processable fluoropolymer. It provides the smoothest and least wettable finish of all of the fluoropolymers. Its optical transparency, chemical inertness, and overall flexibility have made it popular for use in lab equipment. It also has superior electrical properties, with dielectric strength that’s three to four times greater than PTFE can offer.
Like PFA, FEP is melt-processable and injection moldable. Its melting point of 260 °C (500 °F) is about 40 degrees lower than PFA’s. It offers low friction and chemical inertness properties comparable to PTFE’s. However, it is completely transparent. Because FEP is highly resistant to sunlight, it is especially useful for molding parts that are subjected to weathering.
However, not all injection molders are equipped to work with fluoropolymers like PFA and FEP. Performance Plastics LTD. has developed a variety of tools and procedures to address the challenges involved in molding these materials. For example, our solution includes a hot runner system and mold designed to minimize the shear forces inherent in the injection molding process. We use proprietary metallurgy that’s highly resistant to fluorine gas corrosion, which helps extend the working life of the hot runner system, tooling and other components that make contact with the melted resin. We’ve also developed a direct-gating, multi-runner approach to tool design that eliminates the sprue and runner used in traditional injection molding. By eliminating the wasted material associated with the sprue and runner, Performance Plastics has been able to pass along material cost savings of from 20% to 40% by using these expensive resins more economically.
To learn more about how we can cut your resin costs while helping you take advantage of the unique properties PFA and FEP offer, visit our contact page or contact Rich Reed, our vice president of sales and marketing, at (513) 321-8404 or [email protected].
At Performance Plastics, we combine design expertise with automation to ensure tight tolerance part quality and consistency. Automation allows us to efficiently inspect 100 percent of the parts we produce.
Automation is used on all our orders – high and low volume. While automation is critical on high-volume orders, we utilize the technology on our lower volume for technically challenging, mission-critical applications to ensure quality.
Some of our mission-critical applications include:
At Performance Plastics, we use a combination of automation across all our applications. We incorporate automation where cylinders, vacuums, and other actuators are moving products from place to place around the production facility – always testing our tolerances throughout the product cycle.
However, automation does make maintaining tight tolerances a bit simpler. An example is in our over-molding process. Many parts we manufacture include battery contacts that run internally, a metal base, or features made from something other than plastics. Automation can be used to feed these parts into the process without an operator. Less human interaction reduces the possibility of human error and/or injury. Automation places the part in the mold to be over-molded, pulls the completed part out, and then re-inserts the next part quickly and reliably.
Where automation really produces an advantage is at the bottom line – cost savings. For example, cycle times can be greatly improved because automation allows us to do multiple things at once, such as vision checks and leak checks at the same time.
When our reliability increases, our customers’ risk is greatly reduced. Higher reliability and repeatability result in a lower risk of non-compliance.
To learn more about Performance Plastics’ uses of automation, contact Rich Reed, our Vice President of Sales and Marketing, at (513) 321-8404 or [email protected].
Plastic injection molding and 3D printing are both viable technologies. 3D printing is an additive printing process that creates objects by building up layers of material, while injection molding uses a mold that is filled with molten materials that cool and harden to produce parts.
The use of 3D printing in innovative and experimental scenarios is a viable technology for its ability to create custom plastic part designs quickly. However, the 3D process limits your material choices, as all materials are not a fit or even available in a form suitable for 3D printing.
3D printing is best used for:
Once a design has been finalized, plastic injection molding becomes the optimal process. Most of today’s plastic parts are manufactured using plastic injection molding – it’s best for producing large quantities quickly and reliably in high-volume runs. You have greater material options with plastic injection molding, and you can control material weight, cost, and flexibility with endless combinations of materials. It helps organizations control the cost and integrity of designs with complexities and tight tolerances.
Plastic Injection molding is best used for:
At Performance Plastics we have optimized many projects that were once manufactured using 3D printing, only to discover that injection molding was the more efficient technology. As experts in FEP, PFA, PAI (Torlon), PEEK, and Ultem resins we frequently work with mission-critical, time-sensitive applications. 3D printing is an essential component of the design process, but If you have a project that requires high volume (5,000+ parts per year), high-temperature resins, and tight tolerances with complex geometries, plastic injection molding is your solution.
Performance Plastics’ team of experienced engineers possesses the expertise to design and manufacture technically challenging projects and offer complex solutions within harsh application industries.
For more information on how Performance Plastics can assist in your material selection challenges, please contact Rich Reed, VP of Sales & Marketing at 513.321.8404 or [email protected].
The shortage of glass has been an ongoing issue. Experts say the price of glass is on the rise as global supply chain issues continue throughout the world. The glass shortage affects all industries that rely on glass for their containers, but right now, with the convergence of annual flu, the emergence of new COVID variants (Omicron), and the outbreak of Respiratory Syncytial Virus Infection (RSV) in children, the medical field is in dire need of glass for vials.
Silicon, which is one of the materials that is used in glass manufacturing has been in short supply for over a year. Medical vials are made of Type I borosilicate glass, and this form uses the most silicon. The decreases in the recycling rates during the pandemic, are additionally hurting the production of glass vials.
Fluoropolymers such as FEP, PFA, and PCTFE are great alternative materials for glass. These fluoropolymers are superior to conventional plastics. Their inert, non-reactive, and unmatched durability makes their properties ideal for use in the medical industry. These fluoropolymers are also non-stick, ensuring the product does not adsorb to surfaces. They are also virtually impervious to chemical, enzyme, and microbiological attacks. All the benefits of FEP, PFA, and PCTFE make these fluoropolymers a perfect material to create vials out of, especially since they are injection moldable.
At Performance Plastics, we have extensive experience in injection molding fluoropolymers. We have developed proprietary tooling and processes enabling the injection molding of small, thin-walled, complex parts. Our expertise in fluoropolymers and injection molding can be the solution to the shortage of glass.
For more information on how to use fluoropolymers as your glass shortage solution contact Rich Reed, our Vice President of Sales and Marketing, at (513) 321-8404 or [email protected].
PEEK is a high-performance engineering plastic with outstanding resistance to harsh chemicals, excellent mechanical strength, and dimension stability. PEEK (Polyetheretherketone) is an organic thermoplastic polymer, comprised of a semi-crystalline structure which gives it a strong chemical structure.
PEEK is an excellent choice for industrial applications because of its ability to resist harsh conditions:
Resistant to a Wide Range of Chemicals:
PEEK performs in the toughest chemical environments, capable of resisting more than 140 types of acids, bases, oils, liquids, salts, and elements.
Immense Temperature Resistance:
PEEK has an extremely high melting point at 662 °F. It can be used in applications with temperatures up to 482 °F.
Extended Resistance to Hydrolysis Process:
Hydrolysis refers to the chemical process where water is added to a substance. PEEK has the ability to withstand exposure to steam and water for long periods of time without degrading.
Great Durability:
PEEK is tough, stiff, and extremely strong. It has the capability to withstand friction and can perform for long periods of time without suffering from wear and tear.
PEEK is an optimal choice for industrial applications. Most industries see PEEK as the preferred material for parts that are used in extremely harsh application industries. These include oil and gas, mining, heavy equipment, and renewable energy.
Performance Plastics’ team of experienced engineers possesses the expertise to design and manufacture technically challenging projects and offer complex solutions within harsh application industries.
For more information on how Performance Plastics can assist in your material selection challenges, please contact Rich Reed, VP Sales & Marketing at 513.321.8404 or [email protected].
Every project has its own needs and goals. Complex geometries involving fine details or sharp corners often cannot be achieved by traditional plastic molding. Advanced plastic injection molding processes allow designers to combine numerous complex features into a single component, reducing the need for secondary machining or surface finishing operations.
Plastic Injection molding allows design freedom not easily matched by other traditional processes. Performance Plastics’ augments the latest software tools including solid modeling, mold flow analysis and finite element analysis with an internally developed iterative tool design approach to deliver complex geometries and densities superior to most other operations.
Our tooling modification process results in best-in-class part tolerances, particularly useful in molding mission critical parts where dimensional attributes need to be extremely precise. We use this approach to produce net shape molded parts of exceptional quality, eliminating, or significantly reducing secondary matching operations resulting in material and process cost savings.
Performance Plastics, located in Cincinnati, OH has over 30 years’ experience in molding tight tolerance advanced plastics such as Fluoropolymers (FEP/PFA Torlon, Ryton plastic, Peek & Ultem) for many industries. We have developed proprietary processes enabling injection molding of parts that are thin walled, with tight dimensional tolerances, and complex geometries.
For more information and solutions, please contact Rich Reed, Vice President of Sales & Marketing at 513-321-8404 or email [email protected].
Performance Plastics is pleased to announce that we have been awarded a General Services Administration (GSA) Schedule Contract with the federal government for our EnduroSharp® Torlon® non-marring aircraft maintenance tools. The GSA is the centralized authority for the acquisition and management of federal government resources. GSA Schedule Contracts assist federal employees in purchasing products and services.
To be approved for a GSA contract, companies must go through a rigorous process of review that takes months, if not years. The requirements include that the company meet some basic standards of strength and reliability. It must have been in business for at least two years, must be able to demonstrate financial stability, must have successful past performance under its belt, and must be compliant with the Trade Agreements Act.
Additionally, a Dun & Bradstreet Open Ratings Past Performance Evaluation report must be done. This report is an in-depth review of a company’s past performance, which uses Dun & Bradstreet’s own data and analytic resources together with direct customer survey responses to compile a full picture.
Performance Plastics is proud to say that our proposal was approved and can now make our EnduroSharp® tools available to the federal government’s various agencies and employees.
“We are thrilled to have received this contract with GSA and view it as an opportunity to expand our business into new, but not unfamiliar, areas,” said Rich Reed, VP of Sales & Marketing. “PPL has supported federal projects for many years. Through this GSA contract, we now can extend that support even further within the Government sector.”
Our offerings will now be available on the GSAAdvantage! federal online catalog, making them accessible to hundreds of federal customers, including federal and executive agencies, the Department of Defense, the government of the District of Columbia, government contractors authorized to spend federal dollars, and other institutions and organizations that support the federal government.
PEEK or polyetheretherketone belongs to a family of polymers called polyketones or iPAEKs. This means that is it built from the following building blocks:
PEEK is one of the highest performing thermoplastics in the world. Compared to metals, PEEK based materials are very light weight, easily shaped, resistant to corrosion and have considerably higher specific strength (strength per unit weight).
PEEK is optimal for aerospace applications because although it is a thermoplastic, it boasts heat resistance, little to no reaction against harmful chemicals and radiation, and comparable tensile and load strength to that of titanium and steel while being many times lighter.
PEEK® does not offer merely two or three properties that mark it as the polymer of choice for aerospace/defense; it has a whole variety of them. They include:
Tests have shown that PEEK polymer has a continuous use temperature of 260°C (500°F). This can make it suitable for use in a wide range of thermally aggressive environments. PEEK tolerates friction and resists wear in dynamic applications like thrust washers and seal rings.
PEEK resists the damage that can be inflicted in chemically aggressive operational environments. It can resist jet fuel, hydraulic fluids, de-icers and insecticides used in the aerospace industry. This holds true over wide ranges of pressure, temperature, and time.
PEEK offers excellent strength and stiffness over a wide temperature range. PEEK-based composites have specific strength many times that of metals and alloys. “Creep” refers to a material becoming permanently deformed over an extended period when under constant applied stress. “Fatigue” refers to the brittle failure of a material under a repeated cyclic loading. PEEK has both high creep and fatigue resistance thanks to its semi-crystalline structure and has been shown to be more durable than many other polymers and some metals over a long and useful lifetime.
PEEK has excellent flammability performance. It resists combustion up to almost 600°C. When it can be made to burn at very high temperatures, it will not support combustion and it emits little smoke. This is one reason why PEEK is widely used in commercial aircraft.
Aerospace/defense part manufacturers now use PEEK as a way to improve the weight and durability of their parts. PEEK is a standard high-performance plastics in the aerospace/defense industry applications.
Performance Plastics’ team of experienced engineers possess the expertise to design and manufacture technically challenging projects and offer complex solutions within the aerospace/defense industries.
For more information on how Performance Plastics can assist in your material selection challenges, please contact Rich Reed, VP Sales & Marketing at 513.321.8404 or [email protected].
