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CONCISE EXPERT REVIEW EXAMINES ADHESION TO FLUOROPOLYMERS
23 July 2007 - Rapra Technology Limited
| Fluorinated polymers have a number of very useful properties such as excellent chemical resistance. However, they are usually difficult to bond without a pretreatment. The most effective methods to pretreat fully fluorinated polymers were developed in the 1950s. |
Much work, especially on electrochemical and plasma treatments, has since been carried out but to date these have not proved as effective as the early methods. Good adhesion is required in a number of technologies involving fluoropolymers including adhesive bonding, painting, printing, metallisation (via vacuum or solution) and composite production. To achieve a satisfactory level of adhesion, it is often necessary to carry out a pretreatment with both fully and partially fluorinated polymers. In Adhesion to Fluoropolymers the principles of adhesion are considered first (Section 2). Techniques that have greatly increased our understanding of adhesion to fluoropolymers are described in Section 3. Cases where good adhesion is achieved without a pretreatment are examined in Section 4. However, as pretreatments are usually needed to get the required level of adhesion, this review is mainly concerned with the wide variety of methods available to pretreat fluoropolymers (Section 5). A general discussion and conclusions follow. Adhesion to Fluoropolymers is supported by an extensive bibliography compiled from the Rapra Abstracts database on the topic of adhesion to fluoropolymers. This bibliography provides additional information on this topical field. This review will be of interest both to those who already use fluoropolymers and those who are considering using them. About the authors...
Dr Derek Brewis first became interested in adhesion when he joined the Petrochemical and Polymer Laboratory of ICI in 1964. From 1967 he pursued an academic career but retained an interest in adhesion collaborating with various organisations including ICI, BP and the British Ministry of Defence. He is currently interested in the pre-treatments of plastics, elastomers and metals and has over 100 publications in these areas. Dr Ralf Dahm developed a life-long interest in electrochemistry after working on the early development of fuel cells for the Apollo project during the early 1960s. He entered academia in 1971 but maintained close links with industry. He is interested in the electrochemical generation of powerful oxidising and reducing agents and in the application of electrochemical techniques to the surface pre-treatment of polymers and metals and has collaborated with Dr Brewis for more than three decades.
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