Hard Wearing Engineering Plastics

UHMWPE (Ultra High Molecular Weight Polyethylene)
This engineering plastic is very hard wearing and also very low friction and abrasion resistant. It has a similar co-efficient of friction to that of PTFE although its operating temperature is much lower. UHMWPE will machine pretty well and is often fitted to chutes as a lining material when highly abrasive materials such as granite etc are being distributed.

Nylon
Nylon is the most famous hard wearing engineering plastic around and this material is suited to a vast array of components in many applications and environments. Nylon is used in gears, pulleys, bushes and bearings etc and is available in the largest range of sizes of any of the engineering plastics. One of the features of Nylon is the additives which are mixed at the manufacturing stage to further improve wear resistance such as oil and molybdenum which is a graphite like additive and colours the material black. Nylon is also available in grade 6 and 66 as well as grade 12 which are a much softer grade and more suited to shock and impact resistance.

HDPE (High Density Polyethylene)
HDPE is a good hard wearing plastic that is described as having a "waxy" feel to it and is also very abrasive resistant. HDPE is available in both sheet and rod and is totally food contact compatible and can often be found in food production lines as wear strips etc where high volumes of containers are constantly coming into contact with it. HDPE will machine very well using machine tools or routing machines but is difficult to file due to its abrasion resistance.

Tufnol - Whale
Whale grade Tufnol is an industrial laminate made up of layers of cotton fabric and phenolic resin to create a highly wear resistant engineering plastic that can be lubricated with water and is very strong and rigid. Whale Tufnol is manufactured in both rod and sheet although it must be noted that rod grade shouldn't be used for gears or washers due to it's structure, sheet must be used in these applications. The main advantage of Whale Tufnol in a wear component application would be it's very high strength and rigidity.