Material Guide

The Simtech Material Guide provides basic material characteristics to help users with initial qualification and specification of available materials.  Please refer to corrosion resistance table for specific details on chemical compatibility, or contact us now for help specifying the right materials for your project. 

PVC  - Polyvinylchloride

PVC is the most frequently used thermoplastic for industrial systems. It is economical, weather and corrosion resistant, nontoxic and offers an exceptionally wide range of selection for fittings, piping, valves, and system components. Depending on which chemical will be used (refer to chemical resistance table), PVC has a maximum working temperature of 140ºF. PVC installations can use either threaded connections or solvent welded joints. Due to its high corrosion resistance, PVC is commonly used in applications involving acids, salts, water, alkalis, oil, and many other chemicals.

CPVC  - Chlorinated Polyvinylchloride 

Chlorinated polyvinyl chloride, or CPVC, offers the process industry superior corrosion resistance, mechanical strength, and excellent life-cycle economics. CPVC provides longer service life, lower maintenance, and improved process utilization compared with many traditional metal materials used in industry.

Conceptually, CPVC is a PVC homopolymer that has been subjected to a chlorination reaction. Typically, chlorine and PVC react according to a basic free radical mechanism.  CPVC and CPVC share similar chemical resistance with the primary difference being temperature handling. PVC has a maximum working temperature of 140°F (60°C) while CPVC has a maximum of 180° (80°C).   Please refer to corrosion resistance table for more details.  Like PVC, installations can use either threaded connections or solvent welded joints.  

AlphaPlus® PP  - Polypropylene

Its lightweight, high strength, and increased temperature resistance combine to make polypropylene the most attractive thermoplastic of the polyolefins.

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Kynar® PVDF   -  Polyvinylidene Fluoride 

PVDF is a high crystalline fluoropolymer thermoplastic material with outstanding excellent chemical, physical, and mechanical properties. It has excellent chemical and corrosion resistance, is strong, tough, and abrasion resistant, and retains most of its strength to 280ºF (150°C). It is chemically resistant to most inorganic acids and bases, aliphatic and aromatic hydrocarbons, organic acids, alcohols and halogens.  

Kynar® 740 PVDF piping can be made from grades that meet FDA, USP Class 6, ASTM E84 (25/50 rating), NSF 51 & NSF 61. Kynar® pipe can also be foamed to form light weight structures lighter than water.   

Kynar 740 PVDF piping is widely used by the construction, general chemical, semiconductor, pulp & paper, nuclear, mining, metal preparation, petrochemical, pharmaceutical, wastewater, and food and beverage industries. Some common chemicals handled by PVDF are: acetic acid, acid mixtures, biodiesel, bromine, bromobenzene, wet or dry chlorine, chlorinated salts, chlorobenzene, chromic acid, deionized water, hydrobromic acid, hydrochloric acid, hydrofluoric acid, hot sugars, iodine, metallic chlorides, methane sulfonic acid, methyl alcohol, methyl chloroform, phosphoric acid, nitric acid, salicylic acid, salt water, sodium hypochlorite and sulfuric acid.  

HDPE - High Density Polyethylene

The molecular structure of HDPE has minimal branching, which makes it more rigid and less permeable than Low Density Polyethylene (LDPE).  HDPE ranges from flexible to rigid depending on the crystallinity. HDPE is easily joined by heat fusion and hot gas welding and is good for handling media temperatures to 160°F. 

It has excellent chemical resistance to a wide range of common chemicals and is generally resistant to aqueous media (salts, acids, lyes), many polar organic substances (alcohols, ketones, ester, organic acids) and various oils and greases.  HDPE is non-resistant to concentrated oxidizing acids, aromatic hydrocarbons, chlorinated hydrocarbons and solvents.  When stabilized it has good weather resistance and has excellent electrical properties. Because if its higher mechanical strength it is frequently used for abrasion resistant piping in the mining and mineral extraction industries as well as for caustic storage tanks and control piping and tubing. 

TEFLON® PTFE  - Polytetrafluoroethylene  

PTFE is a straight-chain polymer of tetrafluoroethylene. It has a high crystalline melting point (620ºF), very high melt viscosity, and a high maximum use temperature (greater than 500ºF). In addition, it exhibits unusual toughness down to very low temperatures (<-328ºF). It is insoluble in all known solvents and resists attack by most chemicals. Dielectric loss is low, whereas dielectric strength is high; antistick and antifriction properties are most unusual, inert and antiadhesive are the other important characteristics. PTFE is a thermoplastic material with a high chemical resistance rate, as well as nonflammable, radiation resistant, and thermally stable. Applications include ultra pure installations in semiconductor industries, biomedical, pharmaceutical industry, as well as chemical, food, and nuclear waste processing.

TEFLON® PFA - Tetrafluoroethylene-Perfluoro-Propyl Vinyl Ether 

Copolymers of PTFE with perfluoro (propyl vinyl ether) are called perfluoroalkoxy (PFA). PFA share the same characteristics with PTFE except that its melting point is 68º below that of PTFE. Because its melt-flow rates and critical shear rates are higher than other copolymers, it allows PFA to be an injection moldable material. PFA has all the other advantages of PTFE such as high working temperature, antistick performance, resistance to virtually all chemicals, low coefficient of friction, nonflammability, and excellent electrical properties. This is a great material suitable for all applications that require a smooth wetted surface to prevent contamination and bacterial growth.

HALAR®/E-CTFE   -  Ethylene Chlorotrifluoroethylene  

The fluoropolymer ECTFE is a durable copolymer of ethylene and chlorofluoroethylene with excellent  resistance to a wide variety of strong acids, solvents, chlorine, and caustics. It has high-performance properties similar to other fluoroplastics like PTFE (Teflon) with some enhancements and at a higher cost. ECTFE offers high tensile strength, excellent impact and abrasion resistance and ultra-low permeability.  Its permeation resistance to oxygen, carbon dioxide, chlorine gas and hydrochloric acid is 10 to 100 times better than PTFE.

ECTFE offers chemical and corrosion resistance over a wide temperature range from cryogenic (-105°F) to over 300°F (-76°C to +150°C). It also has high resistivity and low dielectric constant and is radiation resistant.  Due to the fact that Halar is very pure, it is used in the semiconductor and other industries for ultrapure water and for high purity hydrogen peroxide. ECTFE is joined by thermal butt fusion.

In addition to chemical fluid handling applications, ECTFE is used to minimize wear in high-friction applications where dimensional stability is a requirement.  It is used as a bearing surface for machine tools, cams and valve seats and for semiconductor tooling.  It is also used for wire and cable ways and in electrical insulators due to its high resistivity and low dielectric constant.

EPDM  - Ethylene Propylene Diene Monomer 

EPDM is a terpolymer elastomer made from ethylene-propylene diene monomer. The M refers to its classification in ASTM standard D-1418

It offers excellent resistance to polar fluids such as water, phosphate esthers, and ketones but is not recommended for petroleum oils and solvents. EPDM possesses excellent resistance to heat degradation, compression set, low temperatures, sunlight, ozone, weathering, abrasion, and tear resistance. It has excellent electrical insulating properties.  The effective temperature range is -70ºF to +300ºF.

VITON®   -  Fluorocarbon FKM / FPM 

Viton, also referred to as FKM or FPM, is a fluorocarbon elastomer having excellent mechanical and physical properties. All FKMs contain vinylidene fluoride as a monomer. It exhibits outstanding resistance to oils, lubricants, mineral acids, salt solutions, blended aromatic fuels and straight aromatics as well as halogenated hydrocarbons. The effective temperature range is -20ºF to +500ºF with limited service to +600ºF. 

FKM is the designation for the fluoroelastomer category according to ASTM 1418. FPM is the international abbreviation according to DIN/ISO 1629.  Viton® is the registered trade mark of DuPont Performance Elastomers.

KALREZ®/CHEMRAZ  (Perfluoroelastomer Polymers)

Chemraz and Kalrez are members of the perfluoroelastomer family. Polymer chemists describe the base (raw) perfluoroelastomers as polymers of three or more monomers in which all hydrogen positions have been replaced with fluorine. The outstanding resistance of perfluoroelastomer vulcanizates to heat and most chemicals and solvents is the result of this state of complete fluorination. The principal monomer of both Chemraz and Kalrez is tetrafluoroethylene (TFE). The effective temperature range for Kalrez is +5ºF to + 600ºF, for Chemraz –20ºF to +450ºF. A white Chemraz compound is available and features less impurities and less electrical conductivity.

NITRILE (Acrylonitrile Butadiene Copolymer aka NBR)

Nitrile is also widely known as Buna or Buna-N.  It is highly chemically resistant to oils and petroleums but is vulnerable to oxidizing media such as most acids. Nitrile has excellent abrasion resistance and is significantly less expensive than Viton® for uses such as butterfly valve seats.