Everything Still Completely Sealed?

In engineering, the term “seal” is used to describe elements or constructions that have the task of preventing or limiting unwanted transfer of substances from one place to another. They cover a wide range of applications, temperatures and media. They can also be classified according to materials: Soft materials (e.g., elastomers, fibrous materials, PTFE, etc.), hard-materials seals (e.g., copper) and multi-material seal (e.g., rubber-steel seals).

Elastomer seals belong to the group of flat seals that are pressed on by external forces and serve a variety of technical applications. Depending on the application, the choice of materials, their design, the required sealing geometry or shape and, of course, the physical and chemical boundary conditions under which the customized seals are to be used are of fundamental importance.

For this reason, detailed knowledge of the physical and chemical conditions to which the application is exposed – such as temperature and pressure ranges, chemical resistance and thus the selection of suitable inert substances – are prerequisites for the successful design of seals.

NETZSCHs´ Dynamic mechanical analysis instruments are the perfect choice here for investigating the seals.