What is polycarbonate?

Polycarbonate is a high-performance tough and transparent amorphous thermoplastic engineering plastic. It has organic functional groups linked together by carbonate groups (–O–(C=O)–O–).

What are the Characteristics of Polycarbonate?

High Impact Strength – Polycarbonate has a high strength that makes it resistant to impact and fracture.
Optical clarity – Polycarbonate can transmit around 90% of light as good as glass.
Lightweight – Polycarbonate has a density of 1.2 – 1.22 make it an excellent alternative to glass.
Chemical Resistance – Good chemical resistance against diluted acids, aliphatic hydrocarbons, and alcohols.
High temperature resistance – Polycarbonate have high heat resistance up to 135°C.
UV resistant – Polycarbonate can be designed to UV resistant with 100% protection from harmful UV rays.
Optical Nature – Polycarbonate offers excellent optical properties with refractive index 1.584.
Dimensional stability – Polycarbonate maintains Dimensional stability between -20°C to 140°C.

Typical Properties of Polycarbonate

	UNITS	ASTM TEST	POLYCARBONATE
Specific gravity (73°F)		D792	1.2
Light transmittance (transparency/clarity)	%	D1003	86
Heat deflection temperature @ 264 psi	°F	D648	270
Tensile strength	psi	D638	9,500
Flexural modulus	psi	D790	345,000
Izod impact (notched)	ft-lbs/in of notch	D256	12.0 – 16.0
Maximum continuous service temperature in air	°F		240
Water absorption (immersion 24 hours)	%	D570	0.15
Coefficient of linear thermal expansion	in/in/°Fx10-5	D696	3.8

What Are The Different grades of Polycarbonate?

Polycarbonate was developed in the middle 20th century by GE in the United States and Bayer in Germany. Well known Trade names are Lexan® by SABIC, and Makrolon® by Bayer MaterialScience. There are different industry grades of polycarbonate available. Most are typically differentiated by the amount of glass fiber reinforcing they contain and the variance in melt flow between them.

how is Polycarbonate processed?

Bending Polycarbonate sheet

Polycarbonate sheets can be bent or deformed by both hot and cold bending method.

Cutting Polycarbonate to size

We Use a fine-tooth blade with table saw to cut polycarbonate sheets with a small tolerance around +/- 1mm.

Thermoforming polycarbonate sheet

 We provides vacuum formig service with Polycarbonate sheets which is ideal for custom trays and panels.

Polycarbonate injection molding

We provide both low and high volume polycarbonate injection molding service in a short time tooling building.

Polycarbonate Extrusion

We manufacture cutomed polycarbonate sheets, rods, tubes, profiles through our Polycarbonate Extrusion service.

CNC machining in polycarbonate

Our CNC Machining for Polycarbonate Parts offers excellent dimensional stability and mechanical properties. 

Is Polycarbonate recyclable?

Yes, Polycarbonate plastic is 100% recyclable and identified by recycling code “7”.

Is Polycarbonate Toxic?

BPA Free Polycarbonate plastic is a perfect material for baby bottles, refillable water bottles, sippy cups, and other food and beverage containers. so it is not toxic, but there is a potential that certain types of polycarbonate could be hazardous in food contact situations due to the release BPA.

What are the Disadvantages of Polycarbonate?

Polycarbonate is very susceptible to scratching. For this reason, clear polycarbonate lenses will typically be coated with a scratch-resistant layer for protection.