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Be sure to visit us at Booth W4943 at NPE2024 - See you there

Customer Service

Plastics Group of America takes great pride in providing its customers with a variety of value-added services. Each offering is designed to meet our customer requirements and demonstrate our commitment to their needs.

Whether it’s providing you with a place where you can profitably recycle your scrap plastics or offering you access to our proprietary ResinKit to help you identify and test resins, acting as a broker or your behalf or offering you a state-of-the-art laboratory to insure the best possible product quality, Plastics Group works with you and for you to make your job easier to do.

TPG is committed to quality and a philosophy of continuous improvement in all its operations. We are proud that we have continued to expand our capabilities and processes to meet our customers’ ever-expanding needs.

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TPGOA Technical Insights

Here are some brief observations from TPG's Director of Technical Services on how compounding technology advancements have impacted the industry. The summaries are meant to inform and provide guidance on several areas in the industry, which will hopefully enhance your understanding of our products and processes. We hope that you find them helpful when determining the best product to use or approach to take for optimizing your next application.

TPG makes every effort to insure that the information contained herein is accurate - however, we accept no liability for the content of this piece, or for the consequences of any actions taken on the basis of the information provided.

Quality Control

The Plastics Group offers exceptional quality control over its process and products

The Plastic Group has a comprehensive quality program in place to ensure product integrity. As an ISO 9001 certified company, TPG is equipped to meet most of your material quality reporting requirements. Our compounding facility features a quality control laboratory furnished with state of the art test and diagnostic equipment to certify and verify a number of material properties. Our laboratory is run by highly-skilled personnel who adhere to strict quality control measures to ensure our products meet your specifications. Our facilities provide the tools necessary to research develop and formulate custom compounds to meet your unique requirements.

Our testing capabilities include:

  • Physical Property Testing
  • Melt Index
  • Izod
  • Flexural Properties
  • Tensile Properties
  • DSC
  • Moisture Content
  • Ash Content
  • Gardner Impact
  • Color Testing

The Plastics Group offers you access to exceptional recycling experts and expertise

Recycling or Toll Processing is a process by which we take your unusable scrap materials and reprocess them into usable form. The Plastics Group can reprocess many different forms of scrap through a number of different techniques. The end result – we produce a viable, usable recycled product that ultimately translates into substantial savings for you.

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Plastics Group is an experienced resin broker and distributor

As a full-service company, along with doing custom-compounding, the Plastics Group buys and sells many resins. We always have a substantial supply of desired resin products in stock, ready for distribution.

If you’d like to be added to our e-mail list and be alerted whenever we have a surplus, or, are looking to make a special purchase, contact Mike Rosenthal directly at (401) 767-2700 ext. 101 or via e-mail at miker@tpgoa.com

The Plastics Group offers its customers free color compounding

By having TPG do the color blending, molders also receive certain operational benefits. These include:

  • First, no blending is necessary and TPG ensures the consistency of the color from lot to lot.
  • Press operators can pay more attention to the other elements of the production process.
  • Costs for blender acquisition and maintenance are reduced or eliminated.
  • Concentrate no longer has to be stored or handled.
  • Regulatory issues associated with some concentrate materials may also be simplified.

The Plastics Group offers commercial (as opposed to critical) color-matching capabilities on a no-charge basis. Processors would normally supply TPG with a color chip or part for matching. TPG will work with our color concentrate suppliers to develop a color concentrate which will not impact the required physical properties of the finished product and ensure lot-to-lot consistency in color.

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Polifil® Material Troubleshooting Guide

1
Blisters
  1. Reduce screw speed
  2. Dry material
  3. Increase back pressure
2
Brittleness
  1. Reduce cylinder temperature
  2. Reduce back pressure
  3. Reduce screw speed
  4. Check for material contamination
  5. Dry material
3
Excessive flash
  1. Reduce cylinder temperature
  2. Reduce back pressure
  3. Reduce injection pressure
  4. Increase clamp pressure
  5. Clean mold faces
  6. Check mold faces for proper fit
4
Gas burns
  1. Increase size of vent
  2. Reduce injection speed
  3. Increase size of gate
5
Oversized part
  1. Reduce injection speed
  2. Reduce injection and holding pressure
  3. Reduce cylinder temperature
  4. Increase mold temperature
  5. Reduce overall cycle time
6
Poor part-to-part uniformity
  1. Check hopper for material bridging
  2. Check heater bands, controllers and thermocouples
  3. Check hydraulic system for pressure variation
7
Poor weld lines and poor surface finish
  1. Increase injection pressure
  2. Increase mold temperature
  3. Increase cylinder temperature
  4. Increase injection speed
  5. Clean cavity surface
  6. Vent mold
  7. Change gate location
8
Short shots
  1. Increase amount of material
  2. Increase injection pressure
  3. Raise material temperature
  4. Increase injection time
  5. Incorporate or enlarge venting
  6. Clean vents
  7. Increase back pressure
  8. Increase size of ...
    • a. Sprue
    • b. Runners
    • c. Gates
9
Silver streaking
  1. Dry material
  2. Increase injection speed
  3. Increase cylinder temperature
  4. Increase mold temperature
  5. Decrease screw speed
10
Sink marks
  1. Increase injection pressure
  2. Increase holding pressure
  3. Increase holding time
  4. Reduce cylinder temperature
  5. Reduce mold temperature
  6. Locate gates near heavy cross sections
  7. Increase gate size
11
Undersized part
  1. Increase injection speed
  2. Increase injection and holding pressure
  3. Increase holding time
  4. Increase cylinder temperature
  5. Decrease mold temperature
  6. Increase size of gate
12
Voids
  1. Use dry material
  2. Reduce cylinder temperature
  3. Increase injection pressure
  4. Increase mold temperature
13
Warping
  1. Check for uneven mold temperature
  2. Reduce molded in stress
    • a. Reduce injection pressure
    • b. Relocate gating
  3. Reduce temperature of ejected part
    • a. Increase cooling time
    • b. Lower mold temperature
  4. Redesign ejection mechanism

Processing Guides

Mineral-Reinforced Polypropylene
Mineral-Reinforced Polypropylene
Polifil® C, RMC, T, RMT, M
Glass-Reinforced Polypropylene
Glass-Reinforced Polypropylene
Polifil® GFPP, GFPPCC, GFRMPPCC
Glass-Reinforced ABS
Glass-Reinforced ABS
Polifil® GFABS
Glass-Reinforced Polycarbonate
Glass-Reinforced Polycarbonate
Polifil® GFPC
Nylon
Nylon
Polifil® GFN/MRN 6, GFN/MRN 6/6, NYLON 6, NYLON 6/6
Reprocessed High Impact Polystyrene
Reprocessed High Impact Polystyrene
Polifil® RP-HIPS
Thermoplastic Polyolefin-Reinforced Polypropylene
Thermoplastic Polyolefin-Reinforced Polypropylene
Polifil® TPO

Frequently Asked Questions

Yes, TPG's Polifil® GFPPCC WS product line is certified to the NSF/ANSI 61 standard. Polifil® GFPPCC WS is available in Natural, White, and Black with 10, 20, 30, and 40% Glass Fiber reinforcement.

Additional information on Polifil® GFPPCC WS can be found here NSF/ANSI 61.
While many Polifil grades may meet the requirements of certain Automotive specifications, they are not listed per se. When you encounter an Automotive specification, try to obtain a callout or copy of the specification. All the inquires regarding conformance to a specific Automotive callout should be referred to Technical Service.
TPG is (and has always been) sensitive to the market's price fluctuations and we try to reflect them in our pricing, continually striving to provide our customers with exceptional value when they're in the market for any PP product.
Copolymer PP has ethylene as a comonomer along with propylene. This polymerization method improves room temperature and low temperature impact strength and elongation. HDT and Tensile Strength will be lowered with the addition of ethylene as well.
Yes, there will be a slight difference in mold shrinkage and physical properties, but it should give a good indication of suitability in the application.
Beaching refers to the loss of color intensity when color concentrate is added to filled feedstock. To counter this effect, you need to increase the percentage of color concentrate added to the filled feedstock until you achieve the appropriate color match. This additional color concentrate can degrade the physical properties of your resin. The Plastics Group provides Free color blending and matching as part of its regular compounding services removing the worry about any of these negative side effects associated with achieving a proper color match.
UV, Ultraviolet Radiation is a result of exposure to strong or direct sunlight. Over a prolonged time UV exposure will cause a loss of physical properties and appearance in the resin. A UV stabilizer or inhibitor will protect the resin and are essential for end products located in strong or direct sunlight. The Plastics Group can custom-compound and formulate all its resin products with a UV-package specific to your application to protect the resins physical properties and appearance.
For one, some companies require their suppliers to have a registered quality program such as ISO to do business. TPG has been an ISO Certified company since 1996 and developed stringent Quality Systems that guarantee we can supply you with the very best products and services at the most competitive pricing available. TPG’s entire ISO certification program is geared towards meeting specific customer requirements and needs. For example, Polifil® product quality is directly based on customer specifications and requirements. This information is used to develop a specific customer profile for each Polifil® product ordered. This customer profile is cross-referenced each time a customer places an order, thus ensuring product integrity and continuity for lot-to-lot consistency. Simply stated, TPG’s ISO certification is another demonstration of the company’s commitment when it comes to meeting its customers’ needs.
A Living hinge is thin sections of plastic that connect two segments of a part to keep them together and allow the part to be opened and closed. Polypropylene Homopolymer and copolymers have exemplary capability as a living hinge.
Polypropylene can be milled or shaped readily on standard machine shop tools. A good finish can be produced in either operation. Burr formations are not a problem since they can be removed easily.
Once the resin is melted; the wear is not much higher than for mineral-filled materials. However, wear will be higher in material handling systems where pellets abrade the lines and hoppers. Thicker transfer lines and gentle radii on all bends will minimize this issue.
While regrind materials will have slightly lower properties; the molder can normally recycle all of the regrind if certain steps are taken. Regrind should be added back in evenly throughout the run, and, molds should be designed with no more than 20% of the weight in sprues and runners.
Over much of the melt flow range of polypropylene, there is a surprisingly little effect on mechanical properties. Most properties will decline slightly as melt flows become higher. About 35 melt flow and above, the material becomes more brittle and losses in tensile properties become more substantial. Higher flow PP will take less injection pressure to fill a mold. However, the material will flash more easily, and high flow materials sometimes suffer from flow marks due to “jetting”, or squirting into the mold too rapidly.
Fractional melt flow PP will have noticeably higher impact properties. PP shear thins quite a bit, so it is often possible to fill even large molds using single-digit melt flow resins. Fractional melt flow PP is rarely injected.
Warp is not directly affected by melt flow. The general molding conditions, degree of mold filling, mold packing, and cooling will have a much greater effect on warp than the resin melt flow.
Thank you for contacting TPG.
One of our staff members will be back in touch with you ASAP with a response to your inquiry. Thanks again for your interest.
Thank you for contacting TPG.
One of our staff members will be back in touch with you ASAP with a response to your inquiry. Thanks again for your interest.