Will PUR change the ecology of the composite circle? Recently, after the editor has an in-depth understanding of polyurethane, I have been thinking about whether PUR will change the ecology of composite materials? Will the market still be dominated by unsaturated and epoxy products? Polyurethane has made many contributions to mankind since its invention by OTTO BAYER in 1937 and is widely used.
Mainly used are soft and hard foam plastics, coatings, adhesives, insulation materials and some basic materials. However, after companies such as Covestro, BASF, and Huntsman successfully developed matrix resins for composite materials in recent years, the emergence of polyurethane resin has provided new vitality and new possibilities for composite materials. Recently, many friends in the composite materials field have paid more and more attention to and are concerned about the application prospects of polyurethane. I am fortunate to have met some practitioners and developers in the polyurethane industry, and have also participated in some projects. I have found that PUR is really great. No, it has so many advantages that current epoxy resins cannot be compared with unsaturated systems. Its good mechanical strength, good toughness, superior fatigue resistance, odorless and other advantages deeply attracted me. Therefore, I firmly believe that polyurethane will bring more possibilities and development to composite materials, and I look forward to more applications being promoted and used. It will also leave a strong mark on its contribution to the composite materials industry.
Excellent tensile fatigue performance
Although it still requires a more harsh environment and production process, but I believe that in the near future as the technology continues to mature and the process is optimized, these difficulties will be solved.
According to investigations and visits by Mr. Chen Bo, the former secretary-general of the China Composite Materials Industry Association, in the past two years, there are now more than 50 polyurethane pultrusion lines in my country. According to his estimate, my country’s polyurethane pultrusion will be the largest in two years’ time. The annual sales volume should be 100,000 tons. Now the main applications are cable trays, doors and windows, profiles and bars, etc.
In terms of winding, more and more customers are developing various products, especially in power systems. The application of polyurethane poles, cross arms, towers, etc. reflects its own advantages and is very rare to be recognized by many power systems.
In terms of vacuum introduction, Covestro successfully used vacuum introduction molding and successfully produced a 37.5-meter blade. If the blade market can be widely used in the future, this will occupy a large share of epoxy resin. .
Polyurethane certainly has many advantages that the epoxy system cannot match with the unsaturated system, but it also has many shortcomings:
The current cost is relatively high;
The environmental requirements are relatively high, so many small and medium-sized customers cannot meet the conditions in a short time, affecting applications;
Professional equipment and facilities are required, which will increase equipment costs;
The stability of the mixture requires regular shutdown and cleaning during pultrusion.
But generally speaking, the application of polyurethane resin in composite materials is very bright. I firmly believe that its appearance will change the structure of the composite material system. The editor is also constantly exploring the possibilities of various applications of polyurethane. Everyone is welcome to discuss its development and application.
