POLYMER COMPOSITION, ITS METHOD OF PREPARATION, ITS USE AND COMPOSITION COMPRISING IT

Abstract

The present invention relates to a polymer composition comprising an epoxy resin and a multistage polymer. In particular the present invention it relates to polymer composition comprising an epoxy resin and a multistage polymer that can be used as a masterbatch. More particularly the present invention relates also to a process for preparing a polymer composition comprising an epoxy resin and a multistage polymer by spray drying or coagulation.

Claims

1. A polymer composition comprising an epoxy resin E1, said epoxy E1 is solid at a temperature below 25° C., and a multi stage polymer, wherein the multi stage polymer makes up at least 20 wt % of the composition.

2. The polymer composition according to claim 1 wherein the epoxy resin is solid at a temperature below 50° C.

3. The polymer composition according to claim 1 the composition comprises at least 30 wt % of multistage polymer.

4. The polymer composition according to claim 1 wherein the epoxy resin is chosen from the group consisting of resorcinol diglycidyl ether, bisphenol A diglycidyl ether, triglycidyl-p-amino-phenol, bromobisphenol F diglycidyl ether, the triglycidyl ether of m-amino-phenol, tetraglycidylmethylenedianiline, the triglycidyl ether of (trihydroxy-phenyl)methane, polyglycidyl ethers of phenol-formaldehyde novolak, poly-glycidyl ethers of ortho-cresol novolak, tetraglycidyl ethers of tetraphenyl-ethane, and mixtures thereof.

5. The polymer composition according to claim 1 wherein the multi stage polymer comprises a) one stage (A) comprising a polymer (A1) having a glass transition temperature of less then 0° C. b), one stage (B) comprising a polymer (B1) having a glass transition temperature of at least 30° C.

6. The polymer composition according to claim 5 wherein polymers (A1) and (B1) are acrylic or methacrylic polymers.

7. The polymer composition according to claim 5 wherein polymer (A1) is a silicone rubber based polymer.

8. The polymer composition according to claim 5 wherein polymers (A1) comprises at least 50 wt % of polymeric units coming from isoprene or butadiene.

9. The polymer composition according to claim 5 wherein stage (A) is the first stage and stage (B) comprising polymer (B1) is grafted on stage (A) comprising polymer (A1).

10. The polymer composition according to claim 1 wherein the composition is in form of a polymer powder having a volume median particle size D50 between 1 μm and 500 μm.

11. The polymer composition according to claim 1 wherein the composition is a solid composition.

12. The polymer composition according to claim 1 wherein the composition is in form of a polymer powder comprising epoxy resin E1, said epoxy E1 is solid at a temperature below 25° C., and the multi stage polymer is a solid free flowing powder.

13. The polymer composition according to claim 1 wherein the composition is in form of a polymer powder comprising the epoxy resin E1, said epoxy E1 is solid at a temperature below 25° C., as a continuous phase and the multi stage polymer as dispersed phase.

14. A process for manufacturing a polymer composition comprising the steps of a) mixing of an epoxy resin E1, said epoxy E1 is solid at a temperature below 25° C., and the multi stage polymer b) recovering the obtained mixture of previous step wherein the epoxy resin E1 and the multi stage polymer in step a) are in form of a dispersion in aqueous phase.

15. The process according to claim 14 wherein the multistage polymer makes up at least 20 wt % of the polymer composition.

16. The process according to claim 14 wherein step a) is made before step b).

17. The process according to claim 14 wherein recovering step b) is made by coagulation or by spray drying.

18. (canceled)

19. (canceled)

20. An epoxy resin comprising polymer composition polymer composition comprising a) an epoxy resin E2 and b) the polymer composition according to claim 1.

21. A process for manufacturing an epoxy resin comprising polymer composition of claim 20 comprising the step of a) mixing epoxy resin E2 with a masterbatch wherein said master batch comprises a polymer composition according to claim 20.

Description

FIGURES

[0165] FIG. 1—Microscopy of comparative example 1: AFM and optical microscopy. The optical microscopy on the surface of a cut of the sample shows heterogeneities visible due to white spots. The AFM analysis in areas of the white spots shows a lot of aggregates of multistage polymer particles. In other areas much less multistage polymer particles are present with occasionally aggregates.

[0166] FIG. 2—Microscopy of example 1: AFM and optical microscopy. The optical microscopy on the surface of a cut of the sample shows homogeneity. The AFM analysis shows good distrubition of multistage polymer particles.

METHODS OF EVALUATION

[0167] Optical Microscopy is done with a ZEISS model.

[0168] Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) is performed with D3100 from the company VEECO in tapping mode. Two modes are used for acquiring images: height mode for obtaining the topography of the surface and phase contrast mode for obtaining the viscoelastic properties.

[0169] For the AFM the sample is broken and for obtaining a thin more or less smooth surface the sample is cooled down to −90° C. and cut with a microtome. The cut slices of the sample have a thickness of about 100 nm.

[0170] Particle Size Analysis

[0171] The particle size of the primary particles after the multistage polymerization is measured with a Zetasizer Nano S90 from MALVERN. The particle size of the polymer powder is measured with Malvern Mastersizer 3000 from MALVERN. For the estimation of volume median particle size D50 a Malvern Mastersizer 3000 apparatus with a 300 mm lenses, measuring a range from 0.5-880 μm is used.

[0172] Glass Transition Temperature

[0173] The glass transitions (Tg) of the multistage polymers is measured with equipment able to realize a thermo mechanical analysis. A RDAII “RHEOMETRICS DYNAMIC ANALYSER” proposed by the Rheometrics Company has been used. The thermo mechanical analysis measures precisely the visco-elastics changes of a sample in function of the temperature, the strain or the deformation applied. The apparatus records continuously, the sample deformation, keeping the stain fixed, during a controlled program of temperature variation. The results are obtained by drawing, in function of the temperature, the elastic modulus (G′), the loss modulus and the tan delta. The Tg is higher temperature value read in the tan delta curve, when the derived of tan delta is equal to zero.

EXAMPLES

Comparative Example 1

[0174] The multistage polymer latex (MP1) is prepared according to the technique described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,278.576, which employs a standard emulsion polymerization technique. Namely the core/shell acrylic polymer is prepared employing 84.2 parts of butyl acrylate, 0.4 parts of butylene glycol diacrylate and 0.4 parts of diallymaleate as elastomeric core, followed by a polymerization of 15 parts of methyl methacrylate. The solid content is 40%. The multistage polymer latex is dried by spray drying, a powder with less than 1% of residual volatiles is obtained.

[0175] The multistage polymer MP1 comprises an (meth)acrylic polymeric core having a Tg<−20° C. as first stage and a (meth)acrylic polymeric shell having a Tg>30° C°C. as last stage.

[0176] The powder of the multistage polymer MP1 is dispered at room temperature (25° C.) with liquid epoxy resin (Huntsman LY556). An hardener polyetheramine (Huntsman, Jeffamnine T403) is added at room temperature. The blend is cured in oven at 120° C. during 2 h.

[0177] As presented in FIG. 1 the microscopy shows inhomogeneous distribution of the particles of the multistage polymer inside the cured epoxy resin. There are places where are nearly no particles and places where there are many particles and agglomerated particles due to bad dispersion capability inside the epoxy resin.

Comparative Example 2

[0178] The same multistage polymer latex (MP1) is prepared as in comparative example 1. The dispersion of MP1 is tried to be mixed with liquid epoxy resin (Huntsman LY556). No dispersion mixture of the two compounds is obtained that could be recovered or spray dried to obtain a solid powder at 20° C.

Example 1

[0179] The multistage polymer latex (MP1) is prepared according to the technique described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,278.576, which employs a standard emulsion polymerization technique. Namely the core/shell acrylic polymer is prepared employing 84.2 parts of butyl acrylate, 0.4 parts of butylene glycol diacrylate and 0.4 parts of diallymaleate as elastomeric core, followed by a polymerization of 15 parts of methyl methacrylate. The solid content is 40%.

[0180] 2421 g of the multistage polymer latex (solid content is 40%) is mixed with 2096 g of an aqueous dispersion of solid epoxy resin (EPI-REZTM Resin 3522-W-60 from Momentive Specialty Chemicals Inc./solid content is 59.2%) and 4054 g of de-ionized water. The dispersion mixture has a solid content of 30.6% and is dried by spray drying, a powder with less than 1% of residual volatiles is obtained.

[0181] This powder is dispersed at room temperature (25° C.) in the same epoxy resin (Huntsman LY556) and hardener polyetheramine (Huntsman, Jeffamnine T403) used in comparative example 1. The blend is cured in oven at 120° C. during 2 h.

[0182] As presented in FIG. 2 the microscopy shows homogeneous distribution of the particles of the multistage polymer inside the cured epoxy resin. This is due to the good dispersion capability of the composition according to the invention inside the epoxy resin.