Hot Plate Welding

Hot Plate Welding joins plastic parts utilizing direct or radiant heat and pressure. During the Hot Plate Welding process, both mating plastic parts are heated simultaneously while being held in a nest / fixture to assure alignment. With the heated components now at the melting point pressure is applied generating the fused weld of the two plastic parts.  Hot Plate Welding can be a viable option for large and geometrically varying parts that require welding.

Hot Plate Welding produces a permanent bond between the two components that may exceed the strength of the parent materials. With proper material selection and weld joint design, a full hermetic seal can consistently be achieved.  While Hot Plate Welding works virtually with all crystalline and amorphous thermoplastics, it is particularly well suited for joining dissimilar materials such as Sanaprene and Polyethylene.

Hot Plate Welding is a dry process that does not require any adhesives, glues, solvents or fasteners. This minimizes risk to both the environment and employee by removing potentially hazardous materials from the process of joining thermoplastic components. Since no adhesives, solvents or mechanical fasteners are used, hot plate welded thermoplastic parts can be readily identified as being recyclable.  The elimination of fasteners also results in reduced part count, inventory and associated cost.

Hot Plate Welding systems can use various sources to drive the hot plate head tooling such as servomotors or pneumatics.  Equally as variable, controls for Hot Plate Welding systems range from the sophisticated logic controls and servo drives with multiple heat zones to simple single heat zone and mechanical methods. The Hot Plate Welding units are available as stand-alone units or as a systems integrated into an automated process.  ToolTex, Inc. produces a full range of systems.

Proper design of the components to be joined is critical to ensuring a successful Hot Plate Welding process.  Factors to consider during design include allowing for dimensional change as the joint is melted and pressed together, assuring there are features that can be utilized to contain flash if required.

Benefit from ToolTex's expertise and extensive Hot Plate Welding experience to help you select the optimal variables and joint configuration for your application performance and cosmetic requirements. As a result ToolTex will help you avoid costly re-designs and tooling changes going forward. ToolTex has successfully joined a variety of multi-cavity parts produced by injection, extrusion or blow molding with Hot Plate Welding.