The Advantages of Cast Urethanes

2.Design Versatility: The imagination may be the most limiting factor as to its use. The urethane material can be used alone or it can be bonded to metal substrates and/or inserts molded into it.

3.Hardness: Hardness ranges from the flexibility of jelly-like materials to the rigidity of nylon gears and bowling bowls (Shore 15A to 85D).

4.Chemical Resistance: Urethane provides excellent resistance to many fuels, oils, chemicals, and other damaging materials.

5.Machineable: The harder materials can be readily machined, drilled, and tapped on standard metal working equipment. Softer materials can be ground.

6.Coefficient of Friction: Dry friction is low in harder materials and high in softer materials. Additionally, molybdenum disulfide can be added to ensure lubricity in harder materials. Softer materials are excellent for feed or drive rollers and wheels.

7. Abrasion Resistance: Urethane parts have replaced metal, rubber, and plastics in many severe wear applications. Life improvements of 5 to 1 and higher are common.

8.Impact Resistance: Even the hardest urethanes have significantly better impact resistance than plastics and composites.

9.Noise: Urethane parts such as bumpers, gears, rollers, and guides help to reduce noise in many applications. Urethane spray-coated feeder bowls reduce noise as well as wear.

10. Electrical: Urethanes offer a favorable combination of electrical properties, such as resistivity, dielectric strength, dielectric constant, and power factor.

11. Weight: Urethanes can be used to reduce a part's weight by as much as 50%.

12.Colors: Urethanes can be cast in any number of colors.

13.Tooling: In addition to making cast urethane parts, urethane itself can be used to make molds directly from an engineering prototype, production part, or metal pattern, significantly less expensively than making metal molds.

14. Turnaround: In a rush situation, it is possible to use an existing part to make a urethane mold, cast a part in the mold, cure it, and deliver it within 24 hours.