Germany-based igus is offering an interesting alternative for OEMs. Four new materials made from recycled plastic are available in the new product range under the iglidur ECO umbrella.

At its production site in Cologne, the plastics specialist develops, and tests optimised high-performance plastics for various applications like plain bearings, linear bearings, ball bearings, spherical bearings, energy chains, cables, 3D printing materials and plastic-based low-cost robotics.

The advantages of tribo-polymers are several — they are lightweight, need low-maintenance and require no additional lubrication throughout their service life.

The company says that using these products offer a huge advantage especially where external lubrication is needed. The company cites that in Germany alone, a million metric tons of lubricating oil are sold every year, the majority ending up in the environment.

Products like iglidur plain bearing technology can reduce this pollution while increasing the application's service life. With the plain bearing product range made of ECO materials, igus starts even earlier in the product life cycle and uses regranulate to produce new plain bearings.

The new series consists of 97 to 100 percent regranulated iglidur materials. To this end, sprue, a classic waste product in injection-moulding production, can be used. The new plain bearing product range includes four materials that demonstrate their advantages in a wide variety of applications: iglidur ECO H is especially resistant to temperature and media and can therefore be used in highly corrosive and hot environments. iglidur ECO P offers high mechanical strength with low moisture absorption and is therefore ideal for outdoor use. The affordable iglidur ECO A180 material is suitable for price-sensitive applications, while iglidur ECO G is extremely robust and versatile.

Like the entire product range of iglidur plain bearings, all ECO materials are lubricant-free, and their service life can be calculated online. In 15,000 tribological tests per year, the new ECO series and the other 58 iglidur materials prove how resistant they are to abrasion and wear. Less abrasion means less microplastic pollution and a considerably longer service life. It is not necessary to replace the machine or individual components soon. If these components are also "smart" and so that they exactly predict their service life during real operation, regular maintenance and replacement are no longer required. The plain bearing is only replaced when it has to be. This can also increase the service life of the individual components in the application. It is not necessary to replace components that are still functioning correctly.