Study on curing kinetics of diallyl-bearing epoxy resin using sulfur as curing agent

In this paper the curing kinetics of diglycidyl ether of 4,4'-diallyl-bisphenol-A (DADGEBA) using sulfur (S) as curing agent was studied by non-isothermal and isothermal differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The kinetic mechanism equations were determined using autocatalytic models and nth-order reaction model. DSC measurement showed that the curing process of DADGEBA/S system contains two steps because of the double exothermic peaks in DSC curve. The model data simulation results indicated that the Sestak-Berggren (SB) model had a great distinction with the experimental data. Isothermal DSC analysis showed that the curing reactions followed Kamal's autocatalytic model when the reaction temperature was below 210 degrees C, and when the temperature was above 210 degrees C the nth-order model can be used to describe the curing reaction process of the DADGEBA/S system perfectly. The two kinetic equations in the entire reaction process of DADGEBA/S system are consistent with the two-step reaction mechanisms of the same system. (c) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.