What is PTFE coated fiberglass tape used for?
The classic application is covering the sealing bars and jaws of heat-sealing equipment and packaging machinery. Those surfaces run hot and press directly onto plastic film, so without a release layer the film welds to the tooling and the machine starts producing rejects.
PTFE, better known by the trade name Teflon, gives a low-friction, non-sticking smooth surface that molten film will not adhere to. Woven fiberglass underneath supplies the mechanical strength and dimensional stability under heat and pressure that a bare PTFE film would not have.
The same construction is used in high-temperature electrical work, where the Class H (180°C) rating, high dielectric strength, low electrical losses and non-tracking behaviour all apply. The wider industrial tape range is at Lalit Jain Industries Pvt. Ltd. (LJIPL).
Why combine PTFE with woven fiberglass?
Because each material supplies what the other lacks. PTFE has the chemical resistance, the electrical properties and the release surface, but on its own it is soft and stretches under load. Woven fiberglass cloth has excellent mechanical strength and holds its shape, but it is not a release surface.
Coating the cloth with PTFE and backing it with a silicone adhesive produces a tape that combines the chemical, electrical and release properties of PTFE and silicone with the mechanical properties of woven fiberglass.
Silicone adhesive is the third part of the system: it is the adhesive family that holds at the temperatures this tape is meant for, where a standard acrylic or rubber adhesive would soften and creep.
What does Class H (180°C) insulation mean?
Class H is a thermal classification for electrical insulation materials corresponding to 180°C. Quoting a class rather than a single temperature describes the material as suitable for continuous service at that level, which is the number that matters in machinery running all shift.
Alongside the Class H rating the tape offers high dielectric strength, low electrical losses and non-tracking behaviour, tracking being the surface carbon path that can form on an insulator over time and defeat it.
Variants include standard PTFE fiberglass tape and Nitto 923S for heating rollers, and custom sizes are available. Send your roller or sealing bar dimensions with your enquiry. Our guide to PTFE fibreglass heat sealing tape explains what a release surface does on a jaw and lists the six things worth measuring first.
For the other tapes used in electrical and electronic assembly work, see tapes for the electronics industry.