Recently, I've begun to research the plastic manufacturing industry. Upon first starting out, I honestly thought it was going to be pretty simple, but I was in for a surprise! There's actually a lot that goes into shaping some of the simplest things, like a coke bottle. Really, the process has been made much easier by experts trying to improve the field. Without the work of several individuals, the mass amounts of plastic production that incur today would never have made it. From discovering different varieties of plastics to reshaping the machinery needed for it, plastic manufacturing has truly come along a way. However, for us to get an accurate understanding of the manufacturing process, we first have to understand plastic itself.

Generally, plastic is a polymer (a large molecule composed of repeating structural units) of high molecular mass. As to be expected with any mass production of a product, plastic may contain a number of other compounds in them. This can be for a number of reasons but it usually serves a purpose of either dropping costs, or improving the product. This really all depends on the manufacturers.

Plastic comes from the Greek word plastikos. Plastikos translates to "able to be shaped or molded." This applies to plastic because during its manufacturing, it is easily manipulated in order to fit the shape of various plastic products. When you begin to look at what kind of products are created and used by these manufacturers, you really begin to see its versatility. For instance, the thousands of different types of exterior panels, tubes, boxes, and plates that are produced by plastic companies every day.

Fortunately, to make things a little easier, there are only two types of plastic. All variations of plastic fall into one of these two categories : thermoplastics and thermosetting polymers. The difference you need to remember with these is that in the case of thermoplastic, there has been a chemical change made, allowing it to be what it is. This is not the case with thermosetting polymers, which makes it unable to be reheated with out exposing it to damage.

Other than these two main types, there are also quite a few other ways to distinguish plastics from one another. Many times, they will be referred to by their physical properties. These can range anywhere from density, durability, and temperature of transition. Knowing all of these things can influence a manufacturer's decision in what material he ultimately buys, depending on the product that they're looking to create.

The number of variations branching off from thermoplastics and thermosetting plastics is truly incredulous. Throughout the time period before, during, and after the second World War, demand for production increased exponentially. This led to experiments in Germany by IG Farben, where he produced two still very widely used plastics. PVC (polyvinyl chloride) and polystyrene are essential to piping, windows, storm drains, and so many other things to this day.

These plastics only scratched the surface, for there was much work to improve over the next several years, and many continued the plastics race. A new contender entering the field was polyamide, or more commonly known as nylon. What shocked everyone so much about nylon was it's ability to stretch without being damaged. Soon after the second World War, demands for nylon climbed to a record high, with women's nylon stockings as one of the best selling products!

Where the industry really took a turn though, was with the first successful making of synthetic rubber. During World War II, it was difficult to get large supplies of natural rubber, and therefore demand for synthetic went up. During the 1940's, production of synthetic rubber increased from 231 to 840,000 tonnes (metric ton). Ever since, it has been essential to both our space exploration and the production of nuclear weapons.