The strong ties which TRIUMF has forged with local industry were evident in the successful production of more than 12000 plastic scintillator bars in a 3-week run at the Surrey factory of Celco Plastics Ltd in November, 2006. Celco specializes in plastic extrusion technology: extrusion is a manufacturing process in which a material, often plastic, is melted and drawn through a die in a continuous length, which is then cut into pieces to create objects of a required shape and cross section. Plastic weather stripping is a common application of extrusion technology. When TRIUMF needed to cheaply manufacture more than 10000 scintillator bars, (each bar having a length on 2m and a square 1cm by 1cm cross-section with a central hole), for the T2K neutrino project, it was immediately clear that casting or machining the bars was not practicable. By joining forces with Celco, employing a patented formula from another research laboratory, and building on the pioneering experience of the KOPIO project at TRIUMF, techniques were developed which enabled the manufacturing to be carried out by local industry for significantly less cost.

The process involves heating the plastic (polystyrene with additional fluors to make it scintillate when traversed by a charged particle) and then forcing the molten plastic through a specially developed die, which imposes the square cross sectional shape and central hole, and covers the outside surface of the bar with a white coating of titanium oxide-loaded plastic. The final product was achieved only after months of development in which TRIUMF scientists and engineers worked closely with Celco staff to optimize the die configuration.
After emerging from the die the continuous length of bar is drawn through a water bath to cool and solidify it, and then cut into 2m lengths. The production line at Celco (with TRIUMF engineer Naimat Khan) is shown in the figure.