In recent years, the Plastics Engineering Department has renovated nearly all of its Ball Hall laboratory facilities. This has been a very expensive project that has been supported by many alumni, corporations and the university itself. Many thanks to the individuals and corporations that have helped in this effort.
There are a number of ways that you, as a Plastics Engineering Alumnus or Friend, can help us keep our Laboratory Facilities as up-to-date as possible. Having an up-to-date lab facility will help us remain the leader in Plastics Engineering education. Please feel free to contact us if you think you can help out.
Plastics Engineering Discretionary Fund
Any friends or alumni wishing to donate funds for laboratory renovations or maintenance should make checks payable to the Plastics Engineering Discretionary Fund. Unlike our Endowment or Scholarship Funds, this departmental fund is used only for laboratory support. The laboratory improvements that have been made over the past few years would not have been possible without this fund.
Equipment and Supply Donations or Consignments
The Plastics Engineering Department has received unprecedented support from its alumni and industry friends. We are always in need of good quality, laboratory-scale plastics processing equipment, auxiliary equipment, testing equipment and laboratory supplies. Equipment manufacturers can donate equipment or place equipment in the labs on a consignment. You may know of surplus equipment that could be put to good use at UMass Lowell.
Company Products
It is often difficult for companies or individuals to make monetary donations, but they can often donate product that they manufacture. We have a need for many products and consumables that your company may manufacture. Let us know if you are able to help in this way.
Our Sponsors
We proudly acknowledge the support of our lab sponsors.
A number of corporations have provided major support for our laboratories. We encourage our alumni to acknowledge the support of these companies whenever you have the opportunity. It is important that our laboratory sponsors realize that UML Plastics Engineering graduates are leaders in the industry. Support these companies whenever possible and encourage these, and other companies to support the department. These corporations include:
- Advanced Polymers
- American Plastics Council
- Arburg
- Autodesk-Mold Flow
- C.W. Brabender
- Dri-Air Industries, Inc.
- Dynisco
- Engel
- Farrel
- Freudenberg-NOK
- Gloucester Engineering
- Krauss Maffei
- Leistritz
- Moldex 3D
- Nissei
- Putnam Plastics
- RJG, Inc.
- Rocheleau Tool & Die
- Society of the Plastics Industry (now Plastics Industry Association)
- Sumitomo
- Technovel Corporation
- Wittmann Battenfeld
Material Support
Over the years, alumni and corporate friends have been very generous with plastics material donations. Let us know if you have any off-specification or surplus materials that we could use in our labs. Extrusion or blow molding-grade polyolefins are in demand along with a variety of injection molding grade resins. Due to the volume required to run processing labs for multiple weeks, we cannot accept partial bags and we strongly prefer weights over 100 lbs. per resin grade. We have very limited storage on campus, so we need to be selective in what we accept. Finally, for safety reasons in a teaching lab environment, we do no accept polyacetal, polyvinyl chloride, fluoropolymers, or polymers with halogenated additives.