Plasma treatment for adhesive bonding of float glass

Project time: 2013 – 2016

Budget: 7 175 000 SEK

Funding: FFI – Strategic Vehicle Research and Innovation

The project has studied how the silanoles are affected by different treatments.

Bonding of glass is complex and contains many interacting parts. Not only the adhesive properties and geometry affect the adhesion and thus the joint strength, but also the glass chemistry and surface purity. The glass surface chemistry can vary for many reasons, and this will affect the joint strength. The glass chemistry of the surface is affected by the ingredients used the glass, the manufacturing process, if the glass during manufacturing is contact with the tin bath or the atmosphere in the float glass process, post process like hardening, coating, bending and ageing, etc.
The aim of the project was to allow the introduction of atmospheric plasma treatment for effective glass bonding for the automotive industry with automated contamination detection. Therefore, the overall objective of the project was to create a stable, reliable and verified process to clean and surface activate with atmospheric plasma before bonding glass with and without ceramic frit and in that way replace the primer performed at the glass manufacturer..
For bonding on glass or ceramic frit, the hydroxyl groups, ≡Si-OH on the glass are important. These groups are the reaction sites for silanes in the adhesive and play a very active role in the chemical bonding between the polyurethane adhesive and the glass. The area is more complex than what was previously anticipated and it is therefore interesting to work further with the verification with the newly developed method with ESCA /XPS for rapid analyze of silanols degree in the glass surface.
The project has also examined and detected differences in bond ability and surface energy between different glasses, adhesives, aging and plasma treatment. The results from the project show that plasma treatment can clean a glass surface from organic contaminants improve the surface energy from an adhesive bonding point of view and can generate a higher level of cohesive failure. One side effect of the plasma treatment performed in the project is heating of the glass surface. This causes a reduction in the rate of silanols on the surface. To compensate for this, a new plasma process was developed and evaluated by chemical analysis and bonding. The study show good results but it would be interesting to verify the results further with more replicates as well as a process optimization.
As part of quality assurance, the project has worked with contamination detection for mass production. The project has been working to identify possible techniques and then evaluate them with a range of existing equipment on the market. A larger screening was done initially and the equipment that yielded interesting results were further studied in a deeper study with aspect to contamination detection level. Many devices had difficulties in identifying the chosen contaminations on the glass, and of those only a few who were able to determine differences in quantity.
In one of the demonstrator cases a fictitious implementation case was performed where personnel from R & D, from production and technical preparation, and researchers took part. The implementation case was supplemented with a FMEA and business case. Another demonstrator case was verifying the effect of plasma treatment on coated surfaces and glass before glass bonding. Plasma treatment was compared with other types of relevant pre-treatment methods. A supplementing work on contamination on paint with chosen detection equipments was also performed with different levels of contamination and for an improved understanding in the effect of contamination with glass bonding a study of bonding on different levels of contamination was performed. . In another demonstrator case one of the automotive manufacturers together with researchers was evaluating the most promising contamination detection equipment in the manufacturing plant for studying the manageability and effects seen with and without washing of the glass. Dissemination of the project was mainly performed through workshops, training and publications. The project group has been very dedicated and has supplemented each other well so the cooperation and the technical work has generated a lot of knowledge.

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