Process for working with Delrin ?

[AZCraig]

I see a lot of vendors are making their end caps (for tanks) out of Delrin.
Is Delrin something that you buy rough blanks of and then mill / machine / lathe into the thing you want ?
Or is it a "casting" type process where you have melted material you pour into a mold and then cure ?

I've got some ideas for tank end caps I'd like to try out, but I'm not sure where to begin.

Is it something common enough that I can pick a machine shop out of the phone book, hand them a 3d model spec of what I want and they can make it ?

I also wonder how ended up with Delrin as the most common material for tank ends (and drip tips, it seems).

AZCraig

 

[roadkillstewie]

misc note: It's also used for mfg of frame sliders for motorcycles.



Polyoxymethylene - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[edit] FabricationPOM is supplied in a granulated form and can be formed into the desired shape by applying heat and pressure. The two most common forming methods employed are injection molding and extrusion. Rotational molding and blow molding are also possible.

Typical applications for injection-molded POM include high performance engineering components (e.g. gear wheels, ski bindings, fasteners, lock systems) and the material is widely used in the automotive and consumer electronics industry. There are special grades that offer higher mechanical toughness, stiffness or low friction/ wear properties.

POM is commonly extruded as continuous lengths of round or rectangular section. These sections can be cut to length and sold as bar or sheet stock for machining.

[edit] MachiningWhen supplied as extruded bar or sheet, POM may be machined using traditional methods such as turning, milling, drilling etc. These techniques are best employed where production economics do not merit the expense of melt processing. The material is free-cutting, but does require sharp tools with a high clearance angle. The use of soluble cutting lubricant is not necessary, but is recommended.

Because the material lacks the rigidity of most metals, care should be taken to use light clamping forces and sufficient support for the work piece.

Machined POM can be dimensionally unstable, especially with parts that have large variations in wall thicknesses. It is recommended that such features are ‘designed-out’ e.g. by adding fillets or strengthening ribs. Annealing of pre-machined parts before final finishing is an alternative. A rule-of-thumb is that in general, small components machined in POM suffer from less warping.

 

[Nodnerb]

The parts that you buy are machined. I do machining at my job. You can see the tooling marks on everything I've purchased. Not saying EVERYTHING by every vendor is machined, but everything I've seen appears to be.
Delrin machines very nicely because it is a dense material. Which also gives it its qualities as a good material for vaping parts.