18 Apr 2003
Long-life Victrex® PEEK™ polymer gear wheels enhance industrial cleaning equipment
Toftejorg A/S of Denmark has specified Victrex® PEEK™ polymer for the spray head drive wheels on its range of industrial cleaning equipment. In addition to its proven chemical resistance to virtually all organic and inorganic solvents, this high performance polyetheretherketone delivers the necessary high mechanical fatigue strength over wide ranges of temperature and pressure.
Toftejorg designs and manufactures a range of equipment for use in a variety of demanding environments. These include cargo ship containers for transporting crude oil, chemicals or solid bulk products. The cleaning equipment is used after unloading the cargo in order to prevent contamination of the new cargo. Depending on the applied pressure and nozzle system, a tank can be completely cleaned within a few minutes.
The stationary or portable cleaning systems are equipped with spray heads, which create special patterns that are based on the flow characteristics of the fluid or on a drive motor. The spray heads’ helical gear wheels were jointly developed with PETERS-plastic GmbH of Germany. PETERS-plastic’s in-house tooling department designed a custom mould for co-injecting an unfilled Victrex® PEEK™ polymer resin onto a pre-heated metal insert.
The use of Victrex® PEEK™ polymer has enabled PETERS-plastic to manufacture gear wheels that resist high mechanical loads and provide long-term resistance to both cleaning agents and aggressive residual media in the storage tanks. In addition, unfilled Victrex® PEEK™ polymer complies with FDA regulations for repeated food contact, which has enabled Toftejorg to market its products in the food and beverage industry.
Victrex® PEEK™ polymer’s ability to bear high mechanical loads with very low wear has made it the material of choice in many other highly loaded gear wheel applications. Quality control at PETERS-plastic has shown that the wheels can be operated easily at torque loads of up to 54 Nm.
Reader enquiries
Helen SwarbrickVictrex plc
Victrex Technology Centre
Hillhouse International
Thornton Cleveleys
Lancashire FY5 4QD
United Kingdom
Tel +44 1253 897700
Fax +44 1253 897701
United Kingdom
Notes for editors
Victrex plc, which has its sales, technical and production headquarters at Thornton Cleveleys in Lancashire, UK, had a turnover of more than £59m in the last financial year. The company exports 97 percent of its Victrex® PEEK™ polymer output to OEMs in the automotive, industrial, medical, food and electronics market sectors in Europe, North America and Asia Pacific.
Information on products, technical support services and sales and distribution contacts worldwide, can be accessed through the company’s web site: www.victrex.com
The PEEK™ Trademark
For many years Victrex plc has been using the PEEK™ trademark to refer to its brand of Polyetheretherketone. Victrex plc is the sole manufacturer and supplier of the Victrex® PEEK™ brand polymer world-wide. PEEK™ is a trademark of Victrex plc.
Related images
Photo caption
Spray head drive wheel, moulded in unfilled Victrex® PEEK™ polymer
around a pre-heated metal insert. The high performance polyaryletherketone resin provides the superior chemical resistance and mechanical strength required for the helical gear wheel used in marine and other industrial cleaning equipment.
(Photo Victrex® PEEK™ VXPR166E0403)
