This article is non-specific in that it doesn’t discuss a single plastic or application. It is geared towards those involved in maintenance at sawmills, planar mills, and OSB plants when something is wrong and a solution isn’t self-evident. In what type of situations should you consult with a knowledgeable plastics distributor, such as Redwood Plastics and Rubber? While there are countless maintenance issues you can run into, plastics tend to do their best work when the following problems are encountered:
1.) Wear & Abrasion
Premature wear is an issue with many metallic sawmill components over too many machines to describe. This could be anything from various bushings, to chain wear, sprocket wear, sheaves, etc. Plastics that would be used in wood manufacturing applications tend to be very slick and by mating them with the metal components you have, or in cases outright replacing those metal components, your reduce wear and extend part life.
2.) Noise
As we just mentioned, mating a plastic to a metal component reduces wear but it also reduces noise. Many jurisdictions require noise to not exceed a certain level and with all the banging, scraping, and machinery running at a mill it is not uncommon for the noise level to be found to be in violation of code. By swapping out metal mating parts for performance plastic parts you will greatly reduce noise – an excellent example is replacing metal sprockets with Redco 750 polyurethane sprockets.
3.) Shock/Impact (finding broken welds?)
Impact is a major maintenance concern at mills – with logs and lumber constantly being conveyed and hitting things, machinery can be damaged and welds broken. Elastomeric products, particularly rubber and polyurethane, perform very well as bumpers and shock absorbers…Redco Deadplate is an absolute standout for this application. If you have broken welds or other impact damage in your mill definitely get in touch.
Plastics can assist in other ways such as reducing power requirements for equipment, if you have questions please contact Redwood Plastics and Rubber today.