What is strapping made of plastic? What is the comparison? Everything you need to know is right here!

Plastic strapping serves as a robust banding material with high tensile strength, finding applications in diverse packaging scenarios such as carton closure, bundling, securing plastic totes, and unitizing both palletized and unpalletized materials for efficient in-plant transfer and shipping. Known for its cost-effectiveness, plastic strapping offers a unique blend of strength and elasticity, ensuring material efficiency and recyclability. Additionally, these straps are moisture-resistant and exhibit effectiveness over a broad temperature range. With UV stable grades available, plastic strapping is suitable for outdoor storage for limited durations, providing extended environmental stability when needed.

Plastic strapping is primarily crafted from two main plastic resins: Polypropylene (PP) and Polyester (PET), with Nylon being less common nowadays. Polypropylene strap is typically produced using virgin resins or a blend of virgin and recycled materials, depending on the desired quality for the strap's intended application. EAM-Mosca exclusively utilizes virgin PP resin for its machine-grade strapping to ensure optimal machine and process efficiency. In the case of PET strapping, EAM-Mosca manufactures it with a blend of up to 100% recycled content, sourced from recycled bottle flake or reprocessed pellets. This approach allows PET to be continually enhanced to nearly virgin quality with each reuse.

Commercial polypropylene (PP) and polyethylene terephthalate (PET) strapping undergo manufacturing through one of two extrusion processes. The more prevalent multi-strand extrusion involves individually extruding straps through a multi-opening die, followed by heating, stretching, annealing, cooling, and coil winding. This stretching aligns polymer chains, enhancing tensile strength and making it a proficient packaging material. On the other hand, sheet extruded straps begin as a wide extruded sheet, oriented in both length and width directions, and then slit to the final width. While their tensile strength may be lower than strand-extruded straps of similar size, certain characteristics make them suitable for specific older machine designs.

Strap surfaces can either be embossed or smooth. Embossing, the imprinting of a pattern onto the strap surface, is more common and enhances performance by providing stiffness, reducing surface friction for better machine feeding, and potentially improving weld strength. Smooth straps often incorporate a surface lubricant to enhance feed and weld reliability.

Coils of these straps are wound on paper cores, with lengths ranging from a few thousand to over 25,000 feet per coil depending on strap size and type. Typical coil weights are approximately 30 pounds for polypropylene and 50 pounds for polyester strapping, though this may vary based on strap strength and coil footage.

PP strapping stands out as the most widely used plastic strap, valued for its versatility and cost-effectiveness. When tensioned within its working range (20-40% of breaking strength), standard PP strap exhibits an elongation of approximately 4-10%, ensuring secure strapping with notable elastic recovery. This strapping remains stable across temperatures, ranging from freezing conditions to higher ambient levels, making it suitable for outdoor storage for limited periods. Industry recommendations suggest a UV life of 30 to 90 days, contingent on sun intensity and color—black being the optimal choice for outdoor use. Additionally, PP strap boasts water and moisture resistance, making it a preferred choice for various general-duty applications, including bundling, carton closing, and tote security.

While some manufacturers provide both hand grade and machine grade PET strap options, EAM-Mosca exclusively specializes in machine-grade PET manufacturing. This focus stems from the inherent advantages of PET strap, as it is naturally stiffer, less susceptible to camber compared to PP strapping, and generates less dust during strapping machine operations. EAM-Mosca produces machine-grade PET strapping in a range of widths from 9mm (3/8”) to 12mm (1/2”), boasting an impressive break strength of up to 750 lbs.