From mass-produced plastics to technopolymers

After the discovery of PVC, polyethylene, polyamides (nylon), and polystyrene, a better understanding of polymerization mechanisms has contributed over the past twenty-five years to the origin of other plastics with physical-mechanical and heat resistant characteristics that allowed it to replace metals, even for purposes that were once considered exclusive to metals. These plastics are also called technopolymers or polymers for engineering. The term superpolymers was even coined for some of them. The technopolymers are polycarbonate, polymethylpentene, the acetalic resins, polyphenylene oxide, the ionomers, the polysulfone resins, the polyimides, polyphenylene sulfide, and polybutylene terephthalate. Though polycarbonate was experimented with in laboratories since 1898, it was produced in commercial quantities only as late as 1959 in Germany and, more or less during the same months, in the United States. Today polycarbonate is considered a technopolymer of higher than average performance and is used to produce, among other things, space helmets for astronauts, corneal lenses that replace eyeglasses, and bullet-proof shields.

Back to index
more

THE MAP
THE MUSEUM
AND ITS' HISTORY
PONT:
THE TOWN
AND ITS HISTORY
A FACTORY,
A TRADITION
A MUSEUM
PLASTIC
MATERIALS
SANDRETTO
INDUSTRIE