Wednesday 30 December 2020

Plastic Part Marking – Overview Codes and Standards (incl. miniguide for downloading)

Hello and welcome to a new post. In this blog post we have a closer look at the plastic part marking standards and their differences.

I made a short presentation about this topic which you can watch here:



Why Part Marking Codes?

Identification of plastics products is easier with a part marking system. This allows for better decision making for:

  •        handling plastic products,
  •        better waste recovery
  •        more efficient disposal.

Overview of Marking Standards

There are three main standards; however there are additional ones for each of the polymers.

ISO 11469:2016: Generic identification and marking of plastics products

Example: acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene polymer “>ABS<”

ASTM D7611: Resin Identification Codes (RICs) consisting out of a equilateral triangle, Resin Identification Number, and abbreviated term for polymeric material.

Example:

ISO 1043, ISO 1629 (rubber), ISO 18064 (TPE): Plastics – Symbols and abbreviated terms:

Part 1: Basic polymers and their special characteristics

Part 2: Fillers and reinforcing materials

ISO 1043 - Part 2: Fillers and reinforcing materials (material)


ISO 1043 - Part 2: Fillers and reinforcing materials (form)


Part 3: Plasticizers

ISO 1043 - Part 3: Plasticizers

Part 4: Flame Retardants

The tables below show an overview of the most common flame retardant classes, as well as the detailed codes. We can distinguish between halogen compounds, nitrogen compounds, halogen-free organophosphorus compounds,inorganic phosphorus compounds, metal oxides, Boron and zinc compounds, silicon compounds, and graphite.


ISO 1043- Part 4: overview of the most common flame retardant classes


ISO 1043 - Part 4: Flame retardant codes


Example:


Examples of often found part marking codes on plastic parts

In this blog post I highlight examples of often found part marking codes on plastic parts and their meaning using the standard ISO 1043.

Summary of standards:

 



In terms of plastic part design for recycling, part marking codes play an important role as well. I have summarized some key point in this post here.

More examples of part marking codes for different plastics compounds can be found here and for PolyArylAmides here.

 Miniguide "Plastic part marking"

Supporting this topic, I  made a miniguide which can be downloaded below. 



Check out my post on flame retardant classifications according DIN EN ISO 1043-4 here.

Thanks for reading and #findoutaboutplastics

Herwig Juster


Interested to talk with me about your polymer material selection, sustainability, and part design needs - here you can contact me 

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Literature:


Literature: 
[1] https://www.iso.org/standard/50590.html

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