Junkosha Debuts New Wrapped Catheter Liners
The new PTFE tape-based components offer medical engineers higher tensile strength and thinner wall constructions.
Updated on Oct. 29, 2026 in Materials Science
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Junkosha has launched a new category of catheter liners featuring PTFE tape-based technology. The company unveiled these components at the MD&M Midwest trade show.
Why it matters
The introduction of wrapped liners provides medical device engineers with thinner, more flexible, and higher-strength materials for building next-generation catheters. This capability aims to support design constraints in increasingly complex cardiovascular and neurovascular procedures.
The manufacturing process relies on wrapping PTFE film around a mandrel to construct the catheter liner wall. This technique aims to exceed the performance of prior liner iterations by increasing tensile strength while reducing overall wall thickness.
The players
Junkosha
A developer of fluoropolymer and carbon fiber products specializing in high-performance materials for medical devices.
The details
The technology utilizes polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) tape—a high-performance, non-reactive fluoropolymer film—wound precisely around a cylindrical mandrel to form the tubular structure. By controlling the overlap and layers of the film during this wrapping process, Junkosha achieves improved mechanical performance compared to traditional extrusion methods. This design flexibility allows engineers to balance the need for minimal wall thickness with the structural integrity required for navigating tortuous vessel paths.
Timeline
October 29, 2026: Junkosha officially unveiled the new liner category at MD&M Midwest.
2027: The company plans to use this platform to meet evolving requirements in the broader catheter market.
The Tech Race
This development follows an industry trend toward thinner, more resilient materials to meet the requirements of the ISO 10555 standard for sterile, single-use intravascular catheters. It directly competes with legacy extrusion manufacturing methods that historically limited the balance between flexibility and tensile strength.
Medical device engineers and R&D teams in Minneapolis and beyond can incorporate these liners into their prototyping workflows starting now. The new category is intended to support a broader portfolio of catheter design solutions throughout 2027.
The takeaway
Junkosha's shift to wrapped PTFE liners offers a measurable path toward more robust catheter designs that maintain thin profiles. Engineers should monitor the company's 2027 product roadmap to see how this platform scales across different medical device applications.
Further reading
Explore the latest innovations in medical components at the Materials Science section.
Source note: This article includes information reported by PlasticsToday.
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