15 сентября, 2015 
Pokraskin The annual consumption of engineering plastics continues to grow [1] and the commodity plastics (polyethylene, polypropylene, poly(vinyl chloride) (PVC) and polystyrene) make up approximately 75% of the total consumption. These commodity plastics are widely used in the packaging industry and in the building/ construction industries (water pipes, vessels, guttering, road cones). Engineering plastics is a term loosely used to describe thermoplastics and thermoset plastics which offer a range of engineering properties (stiffness, strength, toughness and heat resistance) and are used in sectors such as automotive, household appliances and medical devices, etc., and this adhesive guide focuses on these engineering materials as this is where most detailed design effort for the manufacture of small parts is concentrated.
The automotive sector is perhaps the largest consumer of engineering and high performance plastics but other sectors (medical device, electrical and electronics, etc.,) are also considerable users.
In the automotive sector, engineering polymers such as polybutylene terephthalate (PBT) are replacing polyamide in some car electrical components because of their improved dimensional stability. Also, with the ever increasing temperature requirements in under-bonnet applications, liquid crystal polymer (LCP) and polyphenylene sulfide (PPS) have also been replacing polyamide [1].
There are four main polymer classes (thermoplastics, thermosets, elastomers and thermoplastic elastomers) but thermoplastics fall into two distinct classes as amorphous thermoplastics and semi-crystalline thermoplastics (Figure 2.1).
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