If you need any of the following

• Resistance to a specific chemical
• Resilience within a particularly harsh environment
• Specific mechanical properties
• An elastomer that behaves in an unusual or specific way
• A particular finish or aesthetic property
• A combination of properties currently unavailable

Innovators in rubber and extreme rubber materials

We work in two ways.

Firstly, we watch the materials industry and work with new developments to extend them

to elastomers and to fit our customers’ needs.

Secondly, we work with customers to develop compounds for use in a specific industry, environment or application.

You can read more about some of our previous material developments on the links below. However, if you have a particular requirement the best route to success would be to contact us directly to discuss in more detail.

• FRlite® – a silicone with 25% less weight
• HNBR with nanoplatelets – for improved damping

Finding your perfect material

Have you looked at our chemical compatibility table in combination with the material properties table and found nothing suitable for your requirements? We offer polymer consulting services and we will guide you through the following steps to help you find a solution:

1. Rubber materials for extremes: It may not be as complicated as it seems.

As materials consultants, part of our job is to advise you. We list a variety of materials in our guides that are the basic, standard mixes available ‘off the shelf’ and are already in circulation from compounders (our material suppliers).

There is also a range of niche compounds, fully developed and tested for more specialist environments, which will probably match your requirement. There is no ‘magic rubber’ that will do everything – but there is most likely one that will do most of what you need and will meet your critical requirements. Please contact us so that we can help you to identify the right material.

2. Developing a new material or tweaking an old one?

Understanding critical performance requirements

If it turns out that there isn’t a material already available that does what you need, our rubber polymer consultants will speak with you to understand your specifications. We will want to know the critical properties that are non- negotiable. For some customers it might be working temperature, for others it could be compression set or exposure to ozone, or a combination of factors. We will then need to understand the operational environment of the finished component and its purpose.

Adjusting an existing compound

It might be that we can ‘tweak’ an existing compound to stretch one of its properties beyond what it currently achieves. Rubber is made up of a number of raw ingredients, the ratios and specifications of which give it its various properties.

A change to one or two of these will affect its performance. An improvement in one area may result in a minor deterioration in another. If we understand the full requirements of your product, we can work to make sure nothing is lost in terms of critical performance for you.

Developing a new compound

Even the development of a ‘new’ material is really just a variation on an existing one. As you will see from our HNBR with improved damping properties, we used an existing base material and added nanomaterials to it to create a product that would provide a solution.

There were a number of stages in developing this particular material:

• Initial investigation to find, test, and trial nanomaterials until we found the right one
• Understanding and trialling the base material to ensure that we were working with the right masterbatch
• Adjustment of the ingredients as the nanoplatelets were added, to ensure the right balance of raw materials to provide the optimum performance in the areas identified.

3. How long will it take and what will it cost?

It won’t come as a surprise when we tell you that it depends. It depends on the complexity of your requirements, the extremes that you want to take the material to, and the (inter)national standards that you need to meet. More than anything, it depends on what it’s worth to you.

A material that solves a problem can provide far more return than the cost of developing and testing it. If a minor tweak to an existing compound is all that’s needed, it will be quick and reasonably inexpensive – aside from some testing – which you could undertake yourself if you have the set-up.

If the aim is a conceptually novel material, for use in extreme environments with a complex combination of properties, then it may need substantial development time from our rubber polymer consultants, with ongoing testing and re-development.