VirginNylonMeltSpherulites100XXpolredPlt
This is the melt of a thin section from a nylon cast part. Parts cast from virgin nylon have much larger spherulites than parts cast from recycled nylon. That makes the virgin nylon cast much tougher. The parts cast from recycled nylon often failed prematurely.
Transmitted Linear Crossed-Polarized Light with a Full-Wave (Red Plate) Compensator
Definition/Function:
With this type of illumination the thin nylon from the melt crystallizes as sphulites. With the red plate compensator the sphulites are yellow in quadrants 1 and 3 and blue in 2 and 4.
Significance in the Environment:
Recycled nylon has many more nucleation sites, impurities in the melt. As a result many more crystals form and the spherulites are much smaller. Crack propagation occurs much more rapidly in these parts when they are under load.
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