5 Popular High Tensile Strength Plastics Explained

Plastic resins have found a broad range of applications in recent years, and their popularity has only increased by the day. This is owing to their physical and chemical characteristics such as heat resistance and tensile strength. It is also owing to the beneficial features such as versatility, easy availability, excellent moldability, cost effectiveness, and more. Among these, high tensile strength is an important property when it comes to the type of resin used based on application requirement. High tensile strength plastics have emerged as a preferred choice over metal and other materials as they withstand maximum stress without breaking while being stretched or pulled. Would you like to know commonly used high tensile strength plastics? This post answers the same. So, stay tuned.

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Top 5 High Tensile Strength Plastics

For any plastic to be heated, molded, or formed, it needs to be heat resistant and offer structural stability to the final product. The following list describes the five popular high tensile strength plastics in detail.

1. PEEK: Polyether ether ketone or PEEK is the most popular thermoplastic material used across industrial applications. This is owing to the mechanical properties of the material, including exceptional temperature, electrical, and chemical resistance, tensile strength of 14,000 psi, and more. The parts made using PEEK assure consistent performance and high workability even at high temperatures up to 500°F. Other important properties of the material include creep and moisture resistance, high strength-to-weight ratio, low water absorption, radiation-to-chemical resistance, and more. These properties make PEEK a preferred choice for applications where they may get exposed to UV radiation and moisture for a long time. The material can produce high-machined parts such as rings, seals, washers, medical implants, bearings, bushings, and much more.
2. Nylon: This is another popular high tensile strength plastic, which has almost replaced other CNC machining materials in many applications. It is a synthetic polymer made of polyamides. The tensile strength of this material is 12,400 psi, and other beneficial features are as follows:
   • High mechanical strength and toughness
   • Good machinability and wear resistance
   • Temperature resistance and cost efficiency
   • Fatigue resistance
3. PPS: Polyphenylene sulfide or PPS finds uses across industries owing to its chemical resistance, heat resistance, dimensional stability, flame retardation, rigidity, and moisture-heat resistance. Combined with a high tensile strength of 12,500 psi, these features make the polymer stand out. It is widely used in mechanical parts, car parts, and electrical and electronic parts.  
4. Ultem®: Popularly called polyetherimide (PEI), this is perhaps the high-performance thermoplastics widely used in the aerospace and military industries. It is an amber-to-transparent thermoplastic, thus, best suited for both water and hot-air environments. Ultem is known for its excellent mechanical properties, including tensile strength of 15,200 psi. It has easy machinability, high electric strength, temperature resistance, and has exceptional strength and rigidity. The polymer is also used in chemical and medical instrumentation segments owing to its solvent, heat, and flame resistance.
5. PAI: Polyamideimide or PAI has a high tensile strength of 21,000 psi. Thus, it offers high thermal stability, low flammability and smoke emission, good wear, and radiation resistance. Owing to its mechanical properties, it finds uses in printed circuit boards (PCBs), internal combustion engines, jet engines, and thrust washers. Also, it is used in general mechanical components, bearings, valves, gears, electrical connectors, and so on.

Those mentioned above are a few examples of plastics with high tensile strength. An appropriate plastic when machined can be part of several applications. The material selection is of utmost importance, and employing the right machining technique is equally important. CNC machining is the most popular among them. This machining technique can produce precise plastic parts with custom specifications to fulfill the application needs. Want to utilize CNC machined plastic parts for your next industrial project? It is always good to approach a reliable player in machining and fabrication like Brogan & Patrick Manufacturing Corp. Over the years, the company has specialized in providing efficient CNC machining services across the USA.