WOOD COATING BY UV POWDERS

Many wood-based panels are nowadays used in the furniture industry. Their coating is of high interest to ensure high protection properties and decoration features. UV powders recently emerge among the current existing technologies as an alternative to coat wood panels due to the following advantages: they are environmentally friendly, based on 100% solid formulations, their curing process is fast and operated at relatively low temperature, which fully preserves wood structure. Polymerization of UV powders is monitored by Real Time-FTIR under temperature control. The influence of temperature on reactivity is highlighted. Characteristics of UV powder resins, particularly molecular weight and viscosity in melted state, are related to reactivity parameters. The influence of additional multifunctional monomers within the formulations is afterwards investigated. Finally, Dynamic Mechanical Analysis is performed to determine glass transition temperature, crosslinking density and Young’s modulus of the final coatings. Resistance to scratch and methyl ethyl ketone (MEK) is evaluated as well.