Wear behavior of wood finishing products
Scientists have studied the indentation, scratch and wear behavior of UV-cured wood finishing products – and dentified a relation between the crosslinking density of the topcoat and the overall mechanical resistance of the finishing system.
To increase the durability of interior wood products, the behavior of the protective coatings while subjected to wear and deterioration has to be understood in order to be enhanced. Depending on the type of solicitation, mar (i.e. shallow defects), scratches or indentations can be formed, which impact the coating’s appearance and can shatter the perception of the whole product.
In a new work, formulations based on different monomer-oligomer couples were prepared and photo-polymerised to investigate their performances. First, the glass transition temperature and the crosslinking density were determined to understand the contribution of both components in the polymeric network formed upon UV-curing. Then, hardness, and abrasion, scratch and wear resistances were studied.
Importance of the monomer and oligomer structure
The results showcased the importance of the monomer and oligomer structure, functionality and main physical properties. In scratch experiments, the hard and brittle coatings tend to display failures at lower loads than soft and ductile ones. The friction experiments also caused subsurface tearing and fissuring in the soft coatings and generated several fractures in the harder ones. Furthermore, the best overall mechanical resistance was obtained for the couples with high crosslinking density, and a correlation was found between the crosslinking density and the hardness of UV-cured coatings.
The study has been published in Progress in Organic Coatings, Volume 161, December 2021.
