Better alternative to extruded fiberglass?

[rpirog]

Hello All,

I’ve been talking to a Polymer Engineer friend of mine about this problem & he recommended I ask you fine folks as well. I work for a secondary containment company which produces walls to contain oil and chemical spills. Our walls utilize a LDPE liner to act as a membrane and we currently use extruded fiberglass clips to hold the liners on the walls. Our problem is the clips break along the extruded fiberglass grain while putting them on the wall when using a thick liner or if the clips are cold. I’ve been exploring the idea of using some sort of plastic instead of the extruded fiberglass thinking it would hold up better to the stress of bending. The issue is cost, UV rating & flexibility in the cold. Our walls & clips sit in the hot Texas sun for years, or the freezing North Dakota winters. Despite the environment they need to be flexible enough to take on and off, while still keeping their strength to hold the liner tightly in there. Do you have any recommendations?

 

[btrueblood]

So, the clips are cut from the extrusion - what is the orientation of the fibers (i.e. random, or more likely - along the line of the extrusion and thus perpendicular to the cut)? Can you look into using a shorter fiber, in hopes its orientation stays more random?

Also, what is the resin used, epoxy, urethane, polyester? Of the 3, I would expect epoxy to hold up the best, and polyester the worst due to their relative inherent uv stability.

You would likely have better luck with a glass filled, injection molded polymer, probably one of the nylons with suitable uv stabilizers or PPS, or maybe SAN (Pud will be along soon to tell you which one). Or an aluminum extrusion.

 

[btrueblood]

...or a molded epdm part? It might tend to grip the PE film a bit better too.