Plastic materials aren’t all the same – there are many types of plastic available for manufacturers to use. Each has it’s strengths and weaknesses.
In this case, we are dealing primarily with flexible materials and there are several attributes to look for when selecting the best material for a dock bumper. Because of how we are selling this bumper, we have taken the position of selecting the absolute best material we could find – rather than picking the material primarily by price.
In this case, we established several different criteria:
Weatherability – most plastics degrade when exposed to the UV radiation in sunlight. The color can fade and the parts can become brittle, breaking at the slightest touch. We selected a material that is highly UV stabilized and color pigments that are exceptionally resistant to fading.
Tear strength – one of the Achilles heel of many flexible materials is their tear strength – we picked a material that is as tough as you can get. Even if you could poke a hole in it, it would not tear easily.
Plasticizer migration – many flexible materials get hard as they age. This is because the materials added to make them flexible leach out and are washed off or evaporate. Our products are made using very low migration plasticizers, to keep them flexible year after year.
Chemical resistance – many plastics are susceptable to attack from different chemicals like gas and oil and deck sealants. We have picked a material that is inert to almost everything except for acetone.
Mold resistant – the material we use has fungicide built into it – that helps stop the unsightly development of mold on the surface of the bumper.
Of course, all of this comes at a price – once again, there is a measure of truth in “You get what you paid for.” Fortunately, because we are selling direct to the consumer, we cut the cost of multiple shipping and handling – and cut at least one profit step so we can select more expensive, higher quality materials without making the final product so expensive that only the wealthiest customer could afford it.
