Let’s face it: plastic pollution — in the form of litter on land and in the sea or other marine environments — is a serious problem. And while recycling has been part of the solution, it’s complex, time-consuming and, most importantly, costly. Recent estimates show that perhaps only about 10% of plastic is actually recycled….
Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding News
Are “green” plastics about to get greener? The short-answer is “yes,” but not through recycling alone. (More on that later.) Plastic injection molding companies in Illinois and elsewhere are experimenting with “bio-assimilation,” a process by which plastics which are not recycled can safely breakdown and disappear over a period of 6-42 months in landfills, compost…
Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding News
Plastic injection micro-molding, as its name would imply, is an extremely specialized manufacturing process for producing astonishingly small, high-precision thermoplastic components and parts with micron tolerances. It’s become something of a buzzword in plastic injection molding because it pushes the boundries of that manufacturing process to an extreme — a very tiny extreme. The micro-molding…
Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding for Small Parts , Plastic Injection Molding Methods , Plastic Injection Molding News
They’re practically ubiquitous in “these uncertain times”. They’re in restaurants, shops, train stations and airports. They’re in offices, classrooms and, of course, bathrooms — public and private. They’re even in purses and coat pockets. Hand sanitizers, that is. Perhaps, along with nasal swabs, they’re iconic of the entire pandemic. While many have electronic actuators, the…
Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding News
While everyone knows coronavirus test kits are vital to the “war effort” against COVID-19, not many people consider the many hands, hearts and minds that go into their invention and fabrication. And many don’t appreciate the sheer speed of the entire production process, from initial research to finished, packaged product sitting on the doorstep of…
Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding News
Sustainability. You’ve heard the term batted around in every industrial sector. But, until recently, the general public didn’t hear the term associated with the plastics industry, which was viewed in a less than favorable light by environmentally-conscious folks. Well, maybe the press didn’t report it, but that hasn’t stopped plastic injection molding companies in Illinois…
Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding News
It pays to innovate. More specifically, innovation can save you millions on your taxes, if your plastic injection molding company leverages the Research and Development Tax Credit. Each year, the RDTC saves U.S. businesses $10 billion every year and has helped thousands of plastic injection molding companies become more competitive in the global marketplace at…
Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding News , Uncategorized
Almonds taste great in cakes, breads, cereal, candy bars, even liquors. Now there’s research going on that call for a plastics recipe which includes the tasty nut as filler. Well, not the almond itself; more specifically, its shell. Almond shells enhance the strength of plastic more than most conventional materials and are being tested as…
Filed Under:Plastic food packaging , Plastic Injection Molding News , Uncategorized
We take it for granted in our industry: molten plastic cools and crystallizes into some preordained shape in a mold under a predetermined pressure in a process called plastic injection molding. If only it were that easy. The story begins with melted or “molten” plastics. All these polymer molecules look relatively the same at the…
Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding News , Uncategorized
It’s a familiar scenario: You’ve just received a shipment of a mystery resin about which you know very little. Have you ever worked with it before? Not sure. What are the processing parameters? Without any accompanying information, you don’t have a clue. So you start a production run after “guestimating” the processing parameters. Not a…
Filed Under:Plastic Injection Molding News