Color, texture and overall surface quality are crucial with any plastic part. Ensuring aesthetic quality, ABS resin made with mass polymerization uses fewer VOCs and impurities, and the proof is noticeable. Impurities such as VOCs, gels and other residual chemicals can have a noticeable impact on the quality of ABS resins, and ultimately the color of the product.

Traditionally, ABS resin has been made with a multi-step batch reaction process called emulsion polymerization, which requires the use of several processing additives such as emulsifiers and salts. The impurities from the additives can remain in the finished material in detectable levels, contributing to the resin’s yellowish tint.

On one level, impurities create more variability in the material from batch to batch. On the other, the color of the end product tends to be yellowish in tint, which requires further steps to achieve a bright color. Because the mass polymerization process never introduces many of these contaminants to begin with…READ MORE.