Rheological investigation of cure kinetics and adhesive strength of polyurethane acrylate adhesive

In this work, we used rheological techniques to study both the cure characteristics and the degree of cure of polyurethane acrylate adhesive, a type of reactive adhesive used in hard disk component assembly. These results were then correlated with the tensile shear strengths of adhesives. Here, the cure characteristics of polyurethane adhesive were investigated at isothermal conditions ranging from 25 to 120°C. From the rheological results, the gelation time, the vitrification time, as well as the time required to reach the maximum degree of cure, decreased when increasing the curing temperature. The cure rates of adhesive increased with temperature in three temperature ranges, which were retardation zone, vitrification zone, and reaction‐controlled zone. The cure rates in these zones were controlled by slow diffusion, fast diffusion, and the rate of reaction, respectively. From the temperature sweep of fully‐cured adhesives, we found that the crosslinking level of adhesives increased with curing temperatures at different rates depending on the temperature zones as well. Moreover, the adhesive strength measured by tensile shear test was found to also increase correspondingly with the adhesives' T_g, indicating that the crosslinking level directly affected the adhesive strength. The strong dependence of adhesive strength with crosslinking level indicates that the crosslinking level was essential for high adhesive strength. The correlation of cure characteristics and adhesive strengths at various curing temperatures performed in this study can further provide useful information for planning appropriate curing schemes of polyurethane acrylate adhesives used in electronic and other industries. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2012