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  for Metal Finishing since 1989
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Surface reactivity for adhesion

2000

I am a fabricator of custom composite laminates. We bond various skins on various core materials.

One material we do a lot of is ABS. Currently we do a flame treatment on the surface to enhance bonding. I can explain the concept to my technician, but I would like to know if there is literature out there. Also, our flame treater is custom made in-house. Is there something commercially available?

What is a good way to check reactivity? We have a pen that looks like it checks surface energy, but I am unsure how to use it. I am familiar with wet-ability, but is there something easier?

Thank you for any help.

Darin Jensen
- Minneapolis, Minnesota

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DARIN:

We never does flaming ABS because the adhesion is always OK also with 2k waterborne paints. We use inks for testing the surface before painting.

Jan rijn
- GOES HOLLAND
2000

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2000

I work for for a company manufacturing semiconductors. Accurately, I am process engineer of marking processes in my company in Seoul Korea.

I would like to know information about "surface energy kit". We use it to find out condition of body surface molded by thermosetting resin, before we mark by ink.

We have a surface energy kit.This is a pen type, 8 ea/set. The unit of a kit is dyne/ßÖ, a kit gets a value of to 44 from 30.We want to get a value under 30.

Heesung Koo
- Seoul, Korea

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2001

Dear,

I'm working a as equipment engineer, marking operation. Now, we are using test pen,arcotec kit, I wish to know that if the testing result by test pen is pass. Can we sure that it is in good condition for perform mark operation?

Do you have test pen number 44 for sale or not, because we want only one number around 5 piece?. If you want more information please let me know.

Thank you very much and Best Regards,

Chanon Jantarawaranyoo
- Bangkok

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Hello,

I am the Quality Engineer for an automotive company. We are using the Corona technology to apply the tape on the BSM (injection molding). Parts are molded from TPO.

My question: Is there any time frame between parts been molded and the tape has to be applied? Will parts been molded 40 minutes ago receive the same adhesion promotion (corona treatment) as the parts been stored in the warehouse for several weeks (days)?

There is a lot of speculation about this topic. Please resolve our doubts.

Sincerely,

Dnitry Lvov
Automative - AL
2001

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DARIN:

I work for a company which manufactures flame treatment equipment and also sells test inks. Many of our customer's flame treat ABS and can achieve above 55 dynes after flame treatment. We can treat flat or three-dimensional parts such as instrument panels.

Jeff Schwanky, Controls Project Engineer
- Howell, Mi
2004

You can buy dyne pens or inks online like at dynesonline but there are others. you can get pens from about 30 to 66 dynes in increments of 2. just follow the instructions. You need the inks to test the surface energy because it slowly degrades with time. Most of the time it is desirable to treat the part and then apply paint, adhesive, etc. shortly after treatment. Once you have the pens, you can perform time tests yourself. Typically it is very advantageous to achieve about 10 dynes higher on the substrate versus the adhesive or paint to promote strong adhesion. Flame or plasma treatment works well at increasing the surface energy. I prefer plasma because it's safer, works great, and I like the surface result versus flame, it just depends on what you want to do.

Kirk Nicola
- Dearborn, Michigan, USA
September 11, 2008