Industrial Brush Manufacturers
Industrial Brush MaterialsA brush’s performance depends greatly on coarseness, material type, and filament density of the brush’s bristles. Brush manufacturers have at their disposal countless bristle materials, including nylon, polypropylene, horse hair, nickel silver, titanium, copper, bronze, brass, steel, stainless steel, and more.
Every bristle material offers something different. For examples, brushes with nylon bristles may be used in food processing applications such as cleaning fruits and vegetables. Numerous types of strip, cylinder, maintenance, and cleanroom brushes can be made from natural fibers such as horse hair, or synthetic materials such as nylon or polypropylene. Meanwhile, metal wire brush bristle can be made of nickel silver, titanium, copper, bronze, brass, steel, or stainless steel. When manufacturing power brushes, manufacturers sometimes substitute wire filament with abrasive nylon embedded with a mineral grit.
Common handle materials include plastic, rubber, wood, copper, and aluminum.
Industrial Brush TypesBrushes are manufactured in countless configurations. There are so many brushes out there that we can divide them into groups. These groups include material removal brushes, applicator brushes, and specialty brushes.
Material Removal BrushesMaterial removal brushes are those brushes used to clean, polish, or surface treat surfaces. They can be found in a wide range of industries. Examples of material removal brushes include bottle brushes, strip brushes, metal wire brushes, wheel brushes, spiral brushes, cup brushes, power brushes, and brooms.
Bottle brushes can be used for cleaning objects that would be difficult to clean with larger brushes, such as machinery and bottles. Filaments that are found in wire-tube or bottle-cleaning brushes are typically made of metal or nylon.
Strip brushes are abrasive brushes with bristles arranged in a long strip. They can be used as either cleaning tools, or mechanisms that seal off the spaces between doors and door frames. The bristles of strip brushes are composed of nylon, a synthetic material that is strong, durable, and abrasion-resistant.
Metal wire brushes are used primarily for heavy duty surface treatment, like parts cleaning, surface brushing, and surface deburring. They are especially useful when combined with wheel brushes (wire wheel brushes). Metal wire brushes come in both handheld and machine operated varieties. Heavy duty scrubbing applications often involve the use of handheld metal wire brushes, while the machine operated metal brushes are better suited for treating a surface.
Wheel brushes, or cylinder brushes, consist of a circular base or core and wire bristles burrowed in holes that have drilled into said core. Their bristles are usually wire. Most often, they’re used in the continuous brushing, scrubbing or cleaning of industrial surfaces. They can be attached to mechanisms that spin the brushes around at a high speed, enabling the brush to perform surface treatment much more efficiently.
Spiral brushes are quite similar to wheel brushes. They too can be attached to equipment for high speed spin cleaning. Most often, these small brushes are used to clean tubes, pipes, and bottles.
Cup brushes are round brushes with bristles on the edges of their shallow, hollow middle section. They are usually roughly the depth of a short drinking cup. Cup brushes can be designed for light duty or heavy-duty applications. These include paint removal, dirt and debris removal, scale removal, deburring, rust removal, and polishing.
Power brushes, sometimes called machine brushes, are machine-powered brushes that work at variable speeds. Typically, wheel-shaped, they carry out tasks such as rust removal, gear cleaning, paint and coating removal, metal deburring, and surface prep.
The filaments of wheel, cup, and power brushes are typically crimped to prolong its performance even as the rest of the brush wears down. Their bristles can also be encased in a semi-hard polymer and knot-twisted, thus boosting the brush’s cutting action.
Applicator BrushesApplicator brushes are used to apply substances, such as paint or sealant, to a surface. Examples of applicator brushes include artist brushes, paint brushes, and cosmetic brushes.
Artist brushes can be used from detailed cleaning to painting and can be equipped with sable hair or synthetic bristles.
Paint brushes are brushes used to apply paint. They are available in a wide range of sizes, with different handle types, bristle materials, bristle textures, bristle thicknesses, and bristle lengths. This variety enables users to accomplish all styles of painting at different levels of efficiency and precision.
Cosmetic brushes are any brush tools used to apply makeup or other cosmetics. Examples include brow brushes, mascara brushes, and nail polish applicators.
Specialty Brushes Specialty brushes are those brushes with special qualities used for specific processes. Common types of specialty brushes include conductive brushes and tin acid brushes.Conductive brushes, also known as ESD cleanroom nylon static dissipative brushes, are used for functions such as static elimination. They are also used for parts cleaning of sensitive electronics.
Tin acid brushes are brushes used during soldering, when manufacturers encounter acid and/or mucilage. They feature a tin handle and extremely stiff black horsehair bristles.