Tried to use nylon tubing in vacuum reactor, and there seems to be slow leak, and started to suspect that nylon might be problematic due to being hygroscopic, and thus leaking water vapor in low pressure environment. Is there some other plastic tube type that would work, since i like the flexibility of plastic compared to metal pipes. Or is nylon ok after initially giving off some vapor?
Vacuum tubing material?
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In cylindrical Li-ion batteries, the insulation of caps is made of nylon material. In these batteries, air-tightness and very low moisture content are crucial. Therefore, if nylon was problematic sealant, it would not be used in batteries.
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I think your Nylon needs de-gassing for a while. Warming it up while under vacuum might help- use a hair-dryer or hot-air gun.
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My experience with vacuum is in fish oil processing but I recall we had all metal tubing, as we worked at temps where plastic were not possible. Whenever we needed some slight flexibility, copper tubing was used.
Just to answer your question, plastic tubing in general is less than optimal for high vacuum applications, and within these, nylon is said to be particularly problematic for being hydrophilic.
This comes from a vacuum tubing vendor.
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Actually, I normally use PTFE. (Teflon).
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This book - from our 'Useful Book' thread is 350 pages of vacuum system information...
chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www-eng.lbl.gov/~shuman/NEXT/REFs/Vacuum-Technology.pdf
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As there are lots of different grades of polyamide, everyone is probably right...
Nylons (Polyamide)The name "nylons" refers to the group of plastics known as polyamides. Nylons are typified by amide groups (CONH) and encompass a range of material types...www.bpf.co.uk
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