Polycarbonate: Vital Information On A Flexible Material
Posted on: 1 February 2018
Polycarbonate is a special plastic polymer derived from a carbonate composite. It was designed with crash resistance in mind, if you can believe that. Most people do not even know what it is, or why polycarbonate fabrication is a thing. If you want to know more about this material and how it is used in order to decide if it is the right material for your project, here is that vital information on a very flexible material.
All the Weight of a Feather, All the Protection of Steel
For a time in the late eighties and early nineties, car manufacturers were looking for a material that was lightweight but could still protect. The concept was to develop a material that could be used in place of metal for car doors. The hope was to remove the number of fatalities caused in side impact accidents.
While the frames of the car doors would remain steel, the door panels would be something lighter to reduce injuries to the driver and passengers. It had to be lightweight enough to be supported by the steel frame, but impact resistant enough to not crunch into a ball. The result was a series of plastic polymers, one of which is polycarbonate. This material is excellent at preventing intrusion, breakage, and resisting impact. If you try to hit it with major force, the striking object tends to bounce off the rebound of the polycarbonate.
Flexible and Versatile
Apart from using polycarbonate as side panels and bumper material on cars, polycarbonate has found lots of other uses, too. Its flexibility and versatility makes it an excellent replacement for glass, vinyl, and construction materials. If you were to build a house entirely out of polycarbonate, not only could you do that, but you would also have a house that could withstand wayward cars and heavy objects dropping from the sky. Think about that for second.
Fabrication
Fabrication of polycarbonate is not just about creating the material itself. It is all the ways in which you can transform the material into another product. If you would like some polycarbonate products, you can request them from the fabrication company. You can even get them custom-made for your intended purposes, and your custom polycarbonate items are made faster than custom steel parts. Given this material's numerous benefits, you might want to consider swapping many metal and steel parts out for the polycarbonate version.
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