Both thermoplastic elastomer (TPE) and thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) are excellent alternatives to natural rubber latex, silicone, and other compounds for extrusion and injection molding applications. Many key industry sectors rely on TPE and TPU for critical applications, from surgical tubing to automotive components.
Learn more about the similarities and differences between TPE and TPU, their properties, and their most common uses:
What is TPE (Thermoplastic Elastomer)?
Thermoplastic elastomer (TPE) offers many of the properties of natural rubber latex combined with the processing efficiency of plastics. With desirable properties such as flexibility, dimensional stability, and chemical inertness, among others, TPE is a top choice for the medical and food and beverage industries.
What is TPU (Thermoplastic Polyurethane)?
Thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) is a subset of TPE. TPU is a soft polyether type polyurethane that is available in a range of hardness grades. TPU is an ideal compound choice for applications requiring high abrasion resistance, excellent chemical resistance, and clarity, such as outdoor and medical products.
TPE & TPU Similarities
TPE and TPU compounds have a number of noteworthy similarities. TPE is a block copolymer, and, as a subset of TPE, TPU is as well, though there are differences between their hard and soft segments. Both TPE and TPU offer excellent colorability, clarity, flexibility, and elasticity. TPE and TPU are popular in many of the same industries. The medical device and automotive sectors, especially, utilize high quantities of both TPE and TPU. As TPEs and TPUs are fully synthetic, they contain no proteins which can provoke an allergic response that can occur with natural rubber. This makes them a popular choice in healthcare settings.
Both TPE and TPU are compatible with extrusion, injection molding, and other plastics molding processes. Neither TPE nor TPU lose any structural integrity when reprocessed, which means that both of these material classes are recyclable, and production waste can be reused, saving costs.