Handbook of Plastics, Elastomers and Composites - Hardcover

Harper, Charles A.

9780070266865: Handbook of Plastics, Elastomers and Composites

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0070266867 ISBN 13: 9780070266865

Publisher: McGraw-Hill Inc.,US, 1992

Aiming to provide a broad range of new industrial techniques and developments, this book presents the latest information, data and guidelines. It also categorizes plastics and elastics, identifies the materials in each category and presents the advantages of each for major products. The new edition of this reference also examines the chemical and mechanical properties of plastics and elastomers, showing engineers how to utilize these materials in designing products as well as for protective and decorative coatings. This volume now covers a range of new thermoplastics, advances in the development of thermoplastic elastomers, new developments in processing advanced composite materials, the latest high-performance requirements for products with both chemical and mechanical applications, improvements in plastic compositions and processing capabilities and the health and safety aspects of plastics.

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Review:

The fourth edition of Handbook of Plastics, Elastomers, & Composites is revised and updated to reflect the continuous development of polymers and applications using polymers. With recent advances in polymeric materials, many applications are replacing established materials (metals, wood, etc.) with polymeric substitutes. Polymers are finding many new product applications in automotive, aerospace, industrial, and consumer applications. Sorting through the literally thousands of different types of polymers and polymer composites a product designer might be able to choose from can be very time consuming and may not result in the best choice. This handbook provides a valuable source of practical fundamental information on a wide range of materials and material processes, and provides the guidelines for optimizing the use of the material over a number of products.

Since many product designers may not have a background in polymer technology, the first three chapters cover the basics of thermoplastics, thermosets, and elastomers. This background includes many excellent photos of molded plastic parts for each class of polymer, advantages of the modern molding over conventional materials, and a basic but insightful review of the chemistry of polymers. There are also many examples illustrating various molding processes, including sequential drawings of each process step. The next four chapters discuss actual materials -- composites including metal matrix, ceramic, carbon, and thermally conductive composites, coatings and adhesives. These sections review the basics of composites from manufacture, design, properties, environmental effects, and testing. Again, there are many photos and descriptions of the latest products on the market using composite materials. The chapter on joining plastics provides excellent guidelines when bonding with adhesives, thermally, solvents, or mechanical fasteners. This chapter can provide a designer with many ideas for joining plastic parts to produce a more cost-effective and higher-quality joint. There are also two chapters dedicated to automotive and packaging applications and a final chapter on plastics recycling.

This comprehensive handbook would be most useful to product engineers who use plastics in their designs and need to understand the materials, properties, and processes to help determine the best materials for their design. (IEEE Electrical Insulation Magazine 2003-02-10)

Review by Dave Fish

At a welcome-home party for a young man just out of college, a businessman sidles over, pulls him away and gives him some sage advice. "I just want to say one word to you... 'Plastics.' There's a great future in plastics. Think about it." This abbreviated formula for success is given in a 1960s film "The Graduate." But what's interesting is how very little has changed about the appropriateness of that advice in the intervening years.

Charles Harper edited the Handbook of Plastics, Elastomers & Composites. This is the 4th edition of a book that McGraw-Hill first published in 1975. It has kept pace with the times by including, among things, a very current chapter on recycling plastics. I wished that it was more focused on recycling plastics used in electronics, like PLA and similar materials, but it does include, as other chapters of do, a substantial list of references.

But electronics is not the focus of this book. The focus is PLASTICS. This book is intended to be a sourcebook of data for a range of interests. It's aimed at providing a fundamental understanding of plastics, elastomers, and composites to product designers. So for the engineer that managed to get this far without learning to "speak plastics", this book is intended to be a reprieve. It consolidates information, data, and guidelines that augment the suppliers' data sheets and tables for guidance from a single source.

Charles Harper is an old friend of SMTnet. He has hosted several On-Board Forums. SMTnet has published reviews of several of his books. He runs a firm that that presents training courses in electronic packaging and manufacturing to business and industry. Prior to that Mr. Harper worked at Westinghouse. Widely recognized as a leader in this industry, he has authored over a dozen highly respected books. He is among the founders and past presidents of the International Microelectronics and Packaging Society (IMAPS). He is also Series Editor for the McGraw-Hill Electronic Packaging and Interconnection Series, a widely used book series in the electronics industry. Mr. Harper is a graduate of the Johns Hopkins University School of Engineering, where he has also served as Adjunct Professor.

The team of authors for chapters of this book is impressive. Anne-Marie Baker, Ralph E. Wright, Ruben Hernandez, John L. Hull, Carl P. Izzo, James Margolis, Joey Mead, Stanley T. Peters, Edward M. Petrie, Susan E Selke, and Carl H. Zweben.

The first three chapters cover the basics of thermoplastics, thermosets, and elatomers. The next four chapters cover major applications of plastics: composites, composites in electronics, coatings and finishes, and adhesives. The next chapter covers methods for the joining of materials. Possibly a little out-of-place sequentially, the following chapter covers part design in terms of materials selection, machining, molding and post-molding, and mold construction. The final chapters preceding the recycling chapter, mentioned earlier, look at uses of plastic in the automotive and packaging industries. Chapters of the book are:

Chapter 1: Thermoplastics

Chapter 2: Thermosets, Reinforced Plastics, and Composites

Chapter 3: Elastomeric Materials and Processes

Chapter 4: Composite Materials and Processes

Chapter 5: Metal Matrix Composites, Ceramic Matrix Composites, Carbon Matrix Composites, and Thermally

Conductive Polymer Matrix Composites

Chapter 6: Plastics in Coatings and Finishes

Chapter 7: Plastics and Elastomers in Adhesives

Chapter 8: Plastics Joining

Chapter 9: Design and Processing of Plastic Parts

Chapter 10: Automotive Plastics and Elastomer Applications

Chapter 11: Plastics in Packaging

Chapter 12: Plastics Recycling

Appendix A: Glossary of Terms and Definitions

Appendix B: Some Common Abbreviations Used in the Plastics Industry

Appendix C: Important Properties for Designing With Plastics

Appendix D: Electrical Properties of Resins and Compounds

Appendix E: Sources of Specifications and Standards for Plastics and Composites (SMT (Surface Mount Technology) Express 2002-10-17)

Edited by Scott Beckwith SAMPE Technical Director

Charlie Harper is back with another updated Handbook in a long series of successful handbooks. The 4th Edition is larger, updated, and heavily revised. The publication is a thorough sourcebook of practical design, manufacturing and data for all ranges of interests. One of its strengths is that it contains an extensive array of property and performance data, presented as a function of the more important product variables. Further, it presents all the important aspects of application guidelines, fabrication-method trade-offs, design, finishing, performance limits, and other basic polymer and plastic properties. The Handbook's other major features include thorough lists of standards and specifications sources, a completely cross-referenced easy-to-use index, a comprehensive glossary, useful end-of-chapter reference lists, and several appendices containing individual data and information for product engineers. Highly recommended as a reference book. (SAMPE Journal 2002-10-01)

From the Back Cover:

SELECT THE RIGHT PLASTICS FOR YOUR DESIGN IN SECONDS!

Here in one definitive volume are the latest information and guidelines on plastics, elastomers, and composites – for all types of designs, including molded and thermoformed products, protective and decorative coatings, and more.

Featuring a comprehensive treatment of the chemical, mechanical, and electrical properties of plastics, elastomers, and composites, the Handbook gives you state-of-the-art coverage of:
* Plastic compositions and optimizations of plastic product design
* Advances in thermoplastic elastomers
* New developments in applying and processing advanced composition materials
* Plastics and elastomers for high-volume, high-performance automotive and packaging applications
* Important factors in recycling of plastics
* And much more

The Fourth Edition offers new chapters on the advanced use of plastics in automotive and packaging designs and the recycling of plastic composites.

Whether you’re a mechanical, electrical, materials, or chemical engineer, this powerful reference will help you to design better and faster – and take advantage of new stronger and cheaper materials.

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