Why VTEC?

Why Should I Engineer VTEC Into My Applications?

VTEC Polyimide solves difficult materials engineering challenges.

VTEC Polyimide offers an exceptional package of attributes, making it suitable for the needs of a wide range of industries. VTEC stands alone in the world of polymers with its combination of strength, stability, thermal resistance, and electrical properties.

VTEC PI has no observable glass transition temperature or melting point below a decomposition temperature that is well in excess of 500°C.

VTEC overcomes many of the limitations of traditional polyimide materials such as DuPont Vespel and HP Polymer P84, namely brittleness, moisture absorption and fabrication difficulties. VTEC is also a superior alternative material were other high end polymers are considered; such materials include Torlon PAI (polyamide-imide), PEEK (polyetheretherketone), PPS (polypheniline sulfide), Ultem PEI (polyetherimide) and Celazole PBI (polybenzamidazole).

VTEC's unique "Ceramic Plastic" properties make it an excellent choice in many other application areas where engineering factors exist with materials like ceramic, quartz, graphite, metals, phenolics or epoxies.

VTEC Polyimide is available in many forms including finished parts, direct-formed net or near net blanks, and stock shapes for machining, liquids and powders. Custom VTEC compounds can be engineered to meet your service needs. Options include custom polymer chemistries, and fillers (glass, graphite, carbon, Teflon, MoS2, etc.) to enhance specific physical attributes.

VTEC Polyimide Advantages

Exceptional Dimensional Stability
Dimensional instability in plastics is due to the existence of glass transition zones (Tg). VTEC has no truly defined glass transition temperature. As a result, VTEC has exceptional dimensional stability throughout its operating range. Furthermore, unlike other plastics, VTEC's coefficient of thermal expansion is equal in all directions. It does not suffer from the directionality problem inherent to other plastics.

Wide Range of Temperature Performance
VTEC is functional and reliable from cryogenic temperatures to 300°C, excursions to 500°C, depending on mechanical requirements.

Low Outgassing, Non-Contaminating, Biocompatible
Tests have shown VTEC to have zero metal and mineral extractables. VTEC is ideally suited in applications when extremely low levels of impurities and particle generation are critical. This is especially important for medical implant and semiconductor processing applications. VTEC is not rejected by the human body and bone grows around it. VTEC has not yet achieved FDA compliancy, but finished medical devices with VTEC components can be approved. VTEC exhibits extremely minimal weight loss in vacuum at elevated temperatures. Thermal Gravimetric Analysis (TGA) on VTEC at 500°C showed no recordable weight loss.

Exceptional Mechanical Strength
Few plastics come close to VTEC in strength and other mechanical properties over its operating range. It is extremely impact resistant. The addition of glass or other fillers allows VTEC to move into new realms of metal replacement possibility, at a fraction of the weight.

Low Wear and Friction
VTEC offers outstanding performance in all bearing and wear applications. Unfilled VTEC is extremely wear and abrasion resistant, but the addition of fillers such as graphite, carbon and PTFE creates an exceptional self lubricating material with even greater strength and lower coefficients of thermal expansion. VTEC performs hot or cold in both lubricated and non-lubricated environments.

High Compressive Strength and Creep Resistance
VTEC does not soften below 300°C and it has a very high continuous operating temperature; therefore it can handle loads at temperatures well beyond most plastics. Creep at elevated temperature is very low, and improves further with the addition of fillers such as graphite and glass.

Excellent Chemical Resistance, Low Moisture Absorption
VTEC's performance in a broad range of chemical environments is extremely good. This includes acids, bases, organic solvents, industrial fluids, oxidizing agents and oxygen environments. VTEC absorbs very little moisture. In both areas, VTEC outperforms all other polyimides due to its higher density and complex polymer structure.

Outstanding Electrical Properties
VTEC offers the benefits of excellent electrical and dielectric properties over its full usage temperature range. VTEC is exceptionally good at extremely high frequency ranges, up to and beyond 40GHz. Again, due to its lower moisture absorption, VTEC is superior to all other imide and polyimide materials in critical insulating applications such as semiconductor manufacturing and chromatography. For applications requiring static dissipative properties, specialty grades of VTEC can be specified.

Ease of Fabrication
VTEC stock shapes are easily fabricated on common machining centers. Its strength, hardness, low moisture absorption and dimensional stability allow for extremely tight tolerances to be achieved. Small holes, threads, slots and other intricate features are readily accomplished. The tiniest holes can be drilled almost burr free. Post-machining dimensional change, in most cases, is non-existent.