Archive for Plastics Surface Science
Surface Wetting and Pretreatment Methods
By Scott Sabreen, The Sabreen Group Plastics adhesion problems are widespread throughout the industry. A major contributing factor to these problems is that many plastics have chemically inert and nonporous surfaces with low surface tensions. That is, most plastics are hydrophobic and are not naturally wettable. These properties, although advantageous to the design engineer, often [...]
Solving the Problems of Plastics Adhesion
By Scott Sabreen Problems arising from polymeric adhesion bonding are pervasive throughout the plastics industry. Two-dimensional and three dimensional products often require bonding plastic-to-plastic, plastic-to-metal, plastic-to-composite, and so on. In addition to adhesives (epoxies, urethanes, acrylics, silicones, etc.), adhesion bonding applications include adhesion of printing inks, paints and coatings, encapsulants, potting compounds, metallization, and more. [...]
Cold Gas Plasma Surface Modification – Optimize Plastics Bonding Adhesion
By Scott R. Sabreen, The Sabreen Group, Inc. Polymeric and elastomeric substrates often can be extremely challenging to achieve robust bonding adhesion strength to like or dissimilar materials. Bonding applications are not limited to only adhesives, but include printing inks, paints and coatings, encapsulant and potting compounds, metallization and more. This article describes “Low Pressure [...]
Plastics Surface Energy Wetting Test Methods
By Scott Sabreen, The Sabreen Group Question: Our company uses corona discharge/air-plasma pretreatments before bonding to polyolefins. The product surface is textured with remote separation areas, so dyne testing is very difficult. Is there a way to test in-line production without using hazardous dyne solutions? Answer: Yes, there is a new breakthrough technology to measure [...]
