Advances in High Performance Polymers

While polymers with moderately high performance qualities, such as cellulose in wood and cotton have been known for years, these linear polymers could not be extruded or injection molded. However, they were able to withstand the effects of moderately hostile environments. The classic reinforced thermosets could be compression molded and could also be classified as high performance plastics. In contrast, the general purpose thermoplastics, introduced in the 1930\u27s, were readily extruded and injection molded but were not useful at boiling water temperatures. Fortunately, the deficiencies of both the classic thermosets and general purpose thermoplastics have been overcome by the commercialization of a series of engineering plastics including polyacetals, polyamides, polycarbonate, polyphenylene oxide, polyaryl esters, polyaryl sulfones, polyphenylene sulfide, polyether ether ketones and polyimides. Many improvements in performance and processing of these new polymers may be anticipated through copolymerization, blending and the use of reinforcements