Effect of furfuryl alcohol addition on the cure of furfuryl alcohol resin used in the glassy carbon manufacture

Glassy carbon can be manufactured practically without pores, named Monolithic Vitreous Carbon (MVC) or presenting up to 98% in transport pore volume, foam form, denominated Reticulated Vitreous Carbon (RVC). The glassy carbon processing is affected by some processing parameters, among them it can be cited the resin viscosity. The present work involves the optimization of RVC manufacture by monitoring the polyurethane (PU) foam impregnation with furfuryl alcohol resin with different viscosity values, which were obtained by dilution of the resin with different amounts of furfuryl alcohol. The resin samples used in the PU impregnation were characterized by thermal and rheological analyses. These results were correlated with scanning electron microscopy observations and compression test results of the impregnated polyurethane foam. The results show that the rheological behavior of the resin has significant influence on the polymerization step, affecting the homogeneity of impregnated foam and, consequently, its final properties, mainly the mechanical one. The impregnated foam prepared with the furfuryl alcohol resin diluted with 10% of furfuryl alcohol (eta = 11.4 Pa s) showed higher compression values (0.26 MPa). (c) 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Viscosity, pH, and moisture effect in the porosity of poly(furfuryl alcohol)

The poly(furfuryl alcohol) is highly indicated to obtain advanced carbonaceous materials due mainly to its good carbon yield (around 50%) and a controllable cure reaction. In the processing of some carbonaceous materials, such as monolithic vitreous carbon, it is necessary to make sure that the material has the smallest porosity to be used in nobler applications such as heart valves and aerospace integrated systems. In this manuscript, a design of experiments was used to study the influence of viscosity, pH, and moisture in the porosity of the cured material. This study shows that the moisture exerts a significant influence on the porosity and the trend of the results lead to conclude that lower viscosity and moisture, and the use of non-neutralized poly(furfuryl alcohol) resins lead to obtain materials with better quality. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Surface study of vitreous carbon obtained from glassy carbon powder

This work presents a surface study of monolithic vitreous (or glassy) carbon - MVC - obtained from vitreous carbon powder. Defective MVC pieces are crushed in a ball mill and size classified by sifting. The MVC powder is mixed with furfuryl-alcohol resin and compacted in a mould using a hydraulic press. Samples with different powder granulometries are produced in this way and carbonized in a furnace under nitrogen atmosphere. Complete carbonization of the powder is achieved in only one day and losses due to breakage of the pieces is less than 5%. These results compare very favorably with respect to traditional MVC production methods where full carbonization may require up to seven days and losses due to breakage can be as high as 70%. After carbonization, samples are sanded and polished. Surface roughness and microstructure are characterized by light microscopy. Porosity is quantified from micrographs using ImageJ software and nanometric height variations are measured by atomic force microscopy. © 2012 Materials Research Society.

Síntese, dopagem e caracterização das resinas furfurílica e fenol-furfurílica visando a otimização do processamento de carbono vítreo

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Produção de eletrodos em carbono vítreo monolítico e reticulado a partir da resina furfurílica dopada com cobre

The glassy carbon is a material with a huge technological evolution. Due to its lightness, biocompatibility and their thermal and electrical properties this material finds applications in several industrial fields such as electronics, medical, aerospace and chemical. In order to explore the conductive properties of glassy carbon for use as modified electrodes, the present work aims the processing of monolithic and reticulated glassy carbon with colloidal copper for use in electrochemical applications. First, the best parameters for the cure of furfuryl alcohol resin doped were established through viscosimetry measurements and pressurized differential scanning calorimetry. The analysis of the micrographs of the cured resins show that copper concentrations above 3% weight, generate higher porosity in the material. The characterizations of the monolithic and reticulated glassy carbon resulting from carbonization were performed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Raman and Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy, and although it was not possible to detect the presence of copper by SEM, the influence of these particles have been observed by Raman and FT-IR spectra and electrochemical behavior of the material. The decrease in conductivity of monolithic and reticulated glassy carbon in the presence of copper may be related to the defects caused by the presence of copper in the structure of the material.

Sintese e caracterização da resina fenol-furfurílica para a obtenção de carbono vítreo monolítico

The monolithic glassy carbon is a carbonaceous material, isotropic, non graphitizable obtained by means of carbonization of resins up to 1000 °C. The good physicochemical properties make this material applied in several areas such as aerospace, medicine, electronics, chemistry, among others. It has generally been processed from the use of phenolic and furfuryl alcohol resins. These resins have high crosslink density and high fixed carbon content and are therefore widely applied in aerospace. The combination phenol / furfuryl alcohol resins search for obtaining the most suitable process for the glass-like carbon processing with phenolic resins currently available and of lower cost and easier to synthesize than the furfuryl alcohol resin. The main objective of this work is to obtain a phenol-furfuryl resin with high fixed carbon content combined with low porosity of the material. Different synthesis routes have been adopted along with thermal analysis techniques, FTIR and image analysis. The resin obtained through partial synthesis process presented the characteristics sought in this work

Obtenção e caracterização térmica de compósitos nanoestruturados de resina fenol-furfurílica/CNT

Pós-graduação em Engenharia Mecânica - FEG

Synthesis and characterization of polyarylacetylene for use in the monolithic vitreous carbon processing

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)