Finding the right bearing for your application can be challenging, to say the least. Given that there are literally hundreds of thousands of combinations of polymers and metals, with varying press fits and PVs (load and velocity property combined), different tribological properties and tensile strengths, making the final determination can be tricky.

There is usually a good correlation between bonding and wetting. Wettability can be defined as “the ability of a solid surface to reduce the surface tension of a liquid in contact with it such that it spreads over the surface and wets it.”

So, it seems intuitive that good wetting would automatically result in strong bonds. However, this is not always the case. Two different cases where this correlation can break down are:

We recently had a customer ask us for some tips on annealing cast acrylic. There are definitely some potential pitfalls when working with acrylic in both sheet and finished part form, but following the guidelines outlined below should yield excellent results.

We had a longtime customer contact us recently to ask if we had a replacement for the Nylon 6 bearings they were using in their application. The bearings, which were occasionally exposed to moisture, were failing prematurely.

First, a definition: fluoropolymers are a family of plastic resins which are based on fluorine/carbon bonding. The family of products is varied through a manipulation of that bond by adding or subtracting fluorine through other bonds such as chlorine, ethylenes and other chemical agents.

Slide plate bearings provide support and a low coefficient of friction while allowing an object to move (or slide) freely along a supporting surface. They consist of an upper and lower component and can be used in both guided and free-moving applications.

Ultracomp is a family of laminate wound bearing materials with migratory lubricants added to the resin system. All Ultracomp bearing materials are high load, low speed materials designed to operate in extreme conditions without additional lubrication.

When considering your options for treating surfaces, there are many techniques available and many factors to consider. Ultimately, we believe plasma technology renders better bond strengths than other surface treatments and is generally cleaner, faster, and less expensive. Still, a number of other techniques are in common use. Let’s take a look at them now.

We are all aware that plastics expand and contract at different rates. When designing plastic plane bearings, one of the most critical considerations is to understand the thermal reactions of the material; designing not just for the normal operating temperatures of your environment, but to consider the minimum and maximum operating temperatures as well. Otherwise, you may lose the press fit (in cold temperatures) or expand to the point of shaft seizure (with hot temperatures).