Why devel­op­ment part­ners should be involved
in rub­ber and plas­tics projects as ear­ly as possible

A major dif­fer­ence between metal­lic mate­ri­als and elas­tomers or plas­tics is the flex­i­bil­i­ty of their char­ac­ter­is­tics. This fact often pos­es chal­lenges for design­ers when select­ing materials.

The prop­er­ties of met­als are large­ly fixed. If you choose a par­tic­u­lar met­al for your design, you can be sure that the mate­r­i­al will always have the same char­ac­ter­is­tics. These prop­er­ties are well doc­u­ment­ed and avail­able in the form of mate­r­i­al lists. How­ev­er, it is hard­ly pos­si­ble to adapt the specifics of a met­al to the appli­ca­tion scenario.

Plas­tics and elas­tomers, on the oth­er hand, are flex­i­ble. They also have basic prop­er­ties, but these can be mod­i­fied by adding addi­tives. As a result, the char­ac­ter­is­tics of a rub­ber or plas­tic mate­r­i­al depend on its con­fig­u­ra­tion. For exam­ple, if you buy a par­tic­u­lar rub­ber com­pound from two dif­fer­ent sup­pli­ers, you will not get exact­ly the same prod­uct. There are always dif­fer­ences result­ing from the addi­tives used.

In oth­er words, elas­tomers and plas­tics have a high­er vari­able con­tent in their com­po­si­tion than met­als. Their prop­er­ties always depend on the con­text and can be pre­cise­ly adapt­ed to the area of appli­ca­tion. Met­als, on the oth­er hand, are fixed. Their specifics can only be changed to a small extent.

In prac­tice, this dif­fer­ence is main­ly notice­able in the selec­tion of mate­ri­als. When design­ing a met­al part, the design­er can choose from a wealth of mate­ri­als and select the most suit­able one. How­ev­er, it can­not mod­i­fy it fur­ther. When design­ing a rub­ber or plas­tic mold­ed part, the mate­r­i­al selec­tion process is some­what dif­fer­ent. Here, the design depart­ment choos­es a basic mate­r­i­al and adapts it to the con­di­tions with var­i­ous addi­tives. This is a change for experts who have lit­tle expe­ri­ence with plas­tics and elas­tomers. You can’t buy a mate­r­i­al “out-of-the-box”; every com­pound is different.

Of course, there are excep­tions. Espe­cial­ly for wide­ly used appli­ca­tions, there are pre­fab­ri­cat­ed rub­ber or plas­tic com­pounds that already have all the nec­es­sary prop­er­ties. How­ev­er, the design must first check whether the mate­r­i­al is suit­able for the prod­uct at hand. Every com­pound is dif­fer­ent. It is there­fore worth con­sult­ing experts who can point out spe­cif­ic differences.