Question

it appears more and more ceramic and metal objects are being replaced nowadays. These include : 1) household materials (some ceramic bath tubs or floors are replaced with polymer materials ) 2) metal pipes surrounding the house/ building become plastic pipes 3) even our lunch boxes nowdays are made of plastics instead of metal . list one advantage for using polymers but not ceramic/ metals in each of the above mentioned 3 cases and the cited polymer advantage in each case should be different.

Answer 1

1. Household materials (bath tubs or floors):

Advantage of using polymer: Some polymeric materials have low-fouling, acid resistant properties. Low-fouling would result is significantly reduced build-up of dirt on the surface of flooring or bath tub when compared to ceramic surface and also low-adhesive property of polymer surface would enable easy cleaning. Acid resistance of polymer surface would mean that one could use harsh cleaning agents for more number of times on polymeric surface when compared to ceramic surface before the surface starts to exhibit wear and tear.

2. metal pipes surrounding the house/building

Advantage of polymer: Polymer is better insulator than metal and also it is capable of expanding more when compared to metal. As a consequence, the contents of a polymeric pipe would be exposed to environmental fators (temperature) to a lesser extent compared to what would happen with a metal pipe. Thus in freezing temperatures, much lower temperatures would be needed to actually solidify liquid water in polymeric pipe than water in metal pipe. Also, upon freezing, it well known that volume of water increases, thereby resulting in rupturing/cracking of metal pipes under freezing conditions. On the other hand, polymeric pipes would expand and give room for the volume expansion.

3. Luch boxes made of polymer instead of metal:

Advantage of polymer: One of major differences between polymer and metal is transparancy towards microwaves. Polymers are microwave transparant or in other words have very low interaction with mocrowaves, but metals interact strongly often violently when exposed to microwaves. Thus, food in lunch boxes made of polymer could be directly headed in microwave ovens but not so in case of lunch boxes made of metal.