What is “Teflon”?
Teflon is the name trademarked for a family of fluoropolymer products produced by E.I. Dupont Co. How was “Teflon” developed?
In 1938, Dr. Roy Plunkett was working on a project to develop a new form of refrigerants. While working to develop the refrigerants, a by-product was formed possessing a unique combination of characteristics. This amazing slippery material proved inert to most chemicals. The product was given the name polytetrafluoroethylene – more commonly referred to as: PTFE.
Initially, PTFE resins and dispersions were used in the formation of products for the military during WWII. In 1944 the name TEFLON was trade-marked for this unique material. In the mid 1950’s, Dupont released PTFE resins for the commercial market.
Although this material had amazing properties, there were some limitations. In response to these limitations, DuPont developed a new form of TEFLON called fluorinated-ethylene-propylene – more commonly referred to as: FEP. The visual clarity of the FEP material was superior to that of PTFE. The methods of producing products from FEP differed from that FEP making it preferable for specific products such as tubing extrusion & injection molding. However, this product too had limitations. To combat these limitations later products were developed under the TEFLON banner: PFA and HP PFA.
ALTAFLUOR® is a registered trademark of Altaflo LLC
Teflon® is a registered Trademark
of E. I. Dupont
Neoflon® is a registered Trademark of Daikin
When customers request a product listed simply as “Teflon”, they may not be aware that there is a full family of products available under that heading. They may also not be aware that there are other producers of PTFE, FEP, PFA, and HP PFA resins. While these resins cannot “technically” be called TEFLON, they may possess the same, similar or superior properties – they are just produced by companies other than the E.I. Dupont Co.
Do I need “Teflon”?
The simple answer is no. In order to determine the correct product for your application, it is important to review the key properties of each material against your application.
It is equally important to identify the grade of material offered by your supplier. Each grade may have different performance values. Altaflo uses only the highest grades in each category to provide the best end-use performance values for your applications.
For more information on the materials listed above, please consult our catalog. If additional information or samples of a material are required, please contact our customer service department.