• Elastomers and Composites
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• v.50 no.1
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• pp.30-34
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• 2015

Thermo-mechanical treatment process of a compressed open-cell rigid polyurethane foam (OC-RPUF), which was fabricated for the vacuum insulation panel (VIP), was studied to obtain an optimum condition for the dimensional stability by the relaxation of compressive stress. Thermo-mechanical deformation of the sample OC-RPUF was shown to occur from about $120^{\circ}C$. Yield stress of 0.36 MPa was shown at about 10% yield strain. And, densification of the foam started to occur from 75% compressive strain and could be continued up to max. 90%. Compression set of the sample restored after initial compression to 90% at room temperature was ca. 82%. Though the expansion occurred to about twice of the originally compressed thickness in case of temperature rise to $130^{\circ}C$, it could be overcome and the dimensional stability could be maintained if the constant load of 0.3 MPa was applied. As the result, a thermo-mechanical treatment process, i.e, annealing process at temperature of $130{\sim}140^{\circ}C$ for about 20 min as is the maximum compressed state at room temperature, should be required for dimensional stability as an optimum condition for the use of VIP core material.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.2524-2528
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• 2013

Cell opening characteristics dependent on the cell openers for the conventional formulation of a closed-cell polyurethane foam (PUF) was studied using 1-butanol and lithium salt of 12-hydroxystearic acid (Li-12HSA) as the reactive cell opening agents. While cell openining content of only 10.5 % was obtained for the sample with 4 phr of 1-butanol as the single reactive cell opener, that of 98.0% could be obtained for the sample with 2 phr of Li-12HSA as the reactive co-cell opener. As the results, it showed that a fully open-cell rigid PUF could be obtained by introducing a novel reactive cell opener, having a functional group able to form a bulky side-chain on the urethane networks, without severe loss of mechanical properties of the closed-cell PUF like cell size, bulk density, and thermal conductivity.

• Polymer(Korea)
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.8-13
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• 2010

The physical properties of polymeric foams depend on the density of foams, physical properties of base polymers, the content of open cells, and cell structures including the size and its distribution, the shape of cell, and the thickness of skin layer. The foam density is affected by the chemistry of raw materials, the concentration of crosslinking agent and the blowing agent as well as the operating parameters during production process. In this study, the basic formulations of foams are composed of polyester polyol, MDI, amine catalyst, tin catalyst, silicone surfactant, and water. Cross-linking density of polyurethane was increased by using chain extenders. Also, the mechanical properties of polyurethane foam were improved by using the inorganic fillers (silica 1,2 and talc 1,2) having different $SiO_2$ contents and particle sizes. We investigated the properties of modulus, tensile strength, compressive strength and hardness of foams obtained by changing kind of inorganic filler and chain extender, and observed the distribution of inorganic filler as well as variation of cell size within the foams by electron microscopy.