Application of beam mechanics to sensing the cure development of wood-phenolic joints by dynamic mechanical analysis

Modeling and optimizing of wood-based composite manufacture is playing a larger role in the design of processes and manufacturing equipment. In these models, internal temperature and moisture conditions are predicted with an aim towards predicting when polymeric cure is sufficient to avoid delamination. However, most cure kinetics models are focused on predicting the chemical state of the resin rather than the resulting mechanical properties. The objective of this research is to examine the feasibility of obtaining kinetic cure data using dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA). Dynamic three-point bending tests were conducted on a sandwich specimen of two wood adherends bonded with an adhesive layer. The specimen was cured using various isothermal and linear heating regimes. In addition, two commercial PF resins of different molecular weights distributions (labeled as PF-high and -low, respectively) were evaluated under different experimental conditions influencing moisture loss. Theoretically, the E′ ratio, defined as, R = E^′_max / E^′_min should be good parameter to evaluate bond development because it eliminates the variation in adherend modulus. However, this parameter was found to be sensitive to variables such as resin loading and changes in the adherend modulus due to moisture loss and thermal softening. The shear modulus and flexural storage modulus of the adhesive were calculated by an analytical solution. The values were in general agreement with the results obtained by parallel-plate rheometry. Overall, the sandwich beam was deemed to be simple in both sample preparation and measurement procedure for obtaining PF resin cure transitions and modulus development.