Prospector

Prospector in Your Language

We are pleased to offer Prospector in 5 languages:
Deutsch - Español - Français - 华语 - English

When you login to Prospector, a language will automatically be chosen for you based on your internet browser settings. If you prefer a different language, just use the drop down menu in the upper right-hand corner. Here's a short 1-minute video demonstration:

 
 

We hope this change enhances your use of Prospector, and we welcome any translation suggestions and ideas on how we can continue to improve our services.

A full news release is available here.

Dry & Conditioned Plastics Data

On January 14 we released a change in Prospector that now displays both Dry and Conditioned information on plastic material datasheets. Click on the image below to view a larger version.

 

Login to Prospector and search for 'Ultramid' as an example.

Many of our Prospector users have given us some great ideas for services that we plan to roll out in 2010. We would sure like to hear from you with anything that you think would help with your material selection. Please feel free to contact us: 800-788-4668 or 307-742-9227

Information about Dry vs. Conditioned Plastic
"Dry" refers to data that is obtained from a sample of material with equivalent moisture content as when it was molded (typically <0.2%). "Conditioned" on the other hand, refers to data obtained from a sample of material that has absorbed some environmental moisture at 50% relative humidity prior to testing. The vast majority of dry and conditioned data is seen with polyamide (Nylon) materials. To understand the need for two sets of data it's important to understand a little about the structure of Polyamide.

Read full article here.

Top Plastics of 2009

We recently published a report of the most popular plastic materials of 2009. The report provides a list of plastic material products from more than 700 global resin manufacturers including the number of datasheets that were accessed for each product line. Data was collected by IDES from analytical traffic statistics of their Prospector search engine for plastic material datasheets. Since 1986, the IDES Prospector search engine has given design and process engineers access to plastic material information from resin manufacturers through one convenient and standardized source of data.

As the industry's preferred resource for material datasheets, last year more than 300,000 plastics professionals downloaded 3.2 million datasheets using Prospector, a 33% increase over 2008.

 
 

To view the full report, visit: www.ides.com/reports/2009

Top 5 Plastics Webinars of 2009

During the past year we were very fortunate to work with several top experts to share their knowledge with you through live webinars. Each presentation was recorded and they are available to you for free to watch at anytime from the comfort of your own office.

Based on attendance to the live presentations, here are the best webinars of 2009:
(feel free to share with your colleagues too)

1. Scientific Troubleshooting of Common Injection Molding Problems

2. Polypropylene prices are going up. Why?

3. Effective Color Change

4. Part Design for Reducing Cycle Time

5. Energy Efficiency - Best Practices for Lowering Total Part Cost

Click here to receive webinar alerts by email

Searching for Medical Plastics

Property Search allows you to search on specific material criteria such as FDA & USP approvals. In just moments you will have a short list of medical grades suitable for your application. 

Watch this short demonstration to see how to search for Medical Plastics.