Polymerization and curing kinetics of furan resins under conventional and microwave heating

• The furan resin structure was investigated using IR and RMN techniques.
• The polymerization of furan resins was developed based on multistage kinetics.
• Vyazovkin numerical analysis was found the most accurate kinetic method.
• Microwave curing of furan resins was much faster than thermal curing.

The challenge of this work is the microwave curing study of low free-furfuryl alcohol content furan resins. The chemical characterization of the furan resins has been made by infrared spectroscopy and nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. The chemical composition of the resin and its reactions with p-toluensulfonic acid are proposed, with the aim of understanding the mechanism responsible for the main reactions. The results show the presence of methyl and ether bridges between the furan rings, and the formation of ketone and conjugated structures. Furthermore, the curing kinetics of the furan resins has been characterized by differential scanning calorimetry. Different methods have been applied in order to obtain and compare the activation energy of the process. Vyazovkin numerical analysis was found the most accurate method. Finally, microwave and conventional curing processes has been compared. The analysis showed that microwave curing of furan resins was twice faster than thermal curing.

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