Adhesive Backed Gasket

For decades Stockwell has been applying pressure sensitive adhesive backings onto gasketing materials. Adhesive backed gaskets are very appealing to our customers for several reasons. More often engineers and designers are specifying adhesive backings for gaskets. A peel and stick gasket (or peel and stick vibration pad) offers some nice features that plain or non-adhesive backed gaskets don’t have, below is a list of a few. (Link: Stockwell adhesive offerings)

Ease of installation – a peel and stick gasket allows operators and assembly technicians to install a gasket or pad quickly and easily. The time saved by having an adhesive backing justifies the additional cost.

Gasket Positioning – when an adhesive backed gasket is installed and “stuck” in place it stays in place when the lid or mating surfaces are compressed. Without being fixed in place the motion of the mating faces could move or twist the gasket cause a leakage.

Kiss-cutting - adhesive backed gaskets are able to be kiss-cut (see blog posting Oct. 12, 2007). Manufacturing engineers like this because parts are presented to the operators on neat roll and parts are removed from the liner versus individual parts requiring tedious liner removal

Bolt hole position – a supported adhesive backing or double coated adhesive (see blog posting July 30, 2007) gives a gasket that has a series of bolt holes dimensional stability. Essentially the thin P.E.T. layer does not let the gasket stretch in the X and Y dimensions. Without this support layer the gasket may stretch during installation and the holes will not line up.

Stockwell offers a wide range of adhesive backed gaskets. Adhesive backings are applied to the vast majority of materials. These include Poron urethane foam, silicone foam, silicone sponge, solid silicone, Neoprene sponge, electrically conductive gasket materials, thermal pads to name a few. Adhesives such as 3M’s Low Surface Energy (LSE) adhesives, transfer adhesives, double coated (or supported adhesives), thermally conductive adhesives and electrically conductive adhesives are available.

Stockwell is not limited to applying silicone adhesive to silicone rubber. With several proprietary processes, Stockwell is capable of bonding a wide range of quality adhesives including acrylics and silicones. (Stockwell adhesive offerings)

For more information regarding adhesive backed gaskets, grades of adhesive, peel and stick or adhesive offerings, please contact us at service@stockwell.com or 215-335-3005.

New Stockwell Brochure!

Over the last few months Bill Stockwell has been working on a new brochure that highlights Stockwell Elastomerics core products and service. I thought it would be interesting to show a couple pages from an archive brochure. I’m guessing this brochure is from the 1940 – 1950’s. Think about what may have been involved with that brochure. No digital pictures or computers back then!

It’s remarkable how some things remain the same and others do not. As an example on the inside cover of the 1940ish brochure the slogan reads “What we really SELL is SERVICE” this very much holds true for Stockwell today. The old Stockwell Rubber Company sold everything “rubber” whereas today Stockwell Elastomerics is focused on high performance materials (such as silicone, Poron urethane foam, thermal and electrically conductive rubber), custom manufacturing (waterjet cutting, die cutting, slitting, and molding. Quick reliable service is still at the core of Stockwell's business model.

The New 2008 Stockwell Elastomerics Brochure:

For a copy of our New Brochure or more information on our products and services, please contact us at service@stockwell.com or by phone at 215-335-3005.

Large Custom Gaskets

Every so often we receive inquiries for large custom gasket. In some case they are extreme such as the one shown below. In many cases they are for NEMA enclosures (commonly NEMA 4). A single piece gasket generally offers the best seal, however many gaskets exceed the width of the material. In this case a jointed corner may be an option.

Single Piece - a single piece gasket will offer consistent deflection force around the gasket. The con to a large single piece gasket is the center waste. If engineer are making multiple gaskets they can create an assembly level drawing that show several gaskets nested.

Joint and Bond – when a single piece is required but the gasket dimensions exceed the material dimensions, a jointed and bonded gasket may be an option. In most cases this is a die or water jet cut male/female dove tail that is then UV bonded. This type of gasket needs to be evaluated to see that the extra labor of bonding does not exceed the material savings. Also, for foams and sponges the corners will be firmer than the gasket material.

Joint (no bonding) – similar to the Jointed and Bonded gasket, a male/female dove tail is die or water jet cut. In this case the gasket is provided in 4 pieces and is mated during installation. In some cases a bond is never required. This is most dependant on the enclosure configuration and the level of sealing required.

Materials most commonly used for large custom gaskets are silicone foam and silicone sponge. Since the sealing area is relatively large (i.e. square inches) the soft nature of these materials allow for lower closure forces to get proper deflection for sealing.

For more information please feel free to contact us at service@stockwell.com or 215-335-3005.