Experiment § The mystery of flashpoint
The general method of measuring the flashpoint of a chemical substance is to place the substance in a heating container, then continuously increase the temperature, and ignite at the outlet of the container. When a chemical substance produces a volatile gas at a certain temperature and is ignited in the presence of a flame, the temperature is called the flashpoint. Uncured epoxy resin (agent A) has a very high flash point, about 150°C or higher, and its auto-ignition temperature is above 300-400°C. The flashpoint of the uncured epoxy hardener (agent B) is also very high, approximately above 121°C. For the flashpoint of the cured epoxy resin, most of the data are written as N/A (not applicable). Many cured epoxy resins will be cracked due to a high temperature before "flashpoint". The picture on the left shows the cured epoxy resin placed on a TGA (Thermo Gravimetric Analyzer) to test its pyrolysis temperature. The abscissa of the figure above represents temperature, and the ordinate represents weight. The test piece is heated from 25°C to 1000°C at a fixed rate, and the weight is gradually lost from the original 100% due to the high-temperature cracking and the generation of volatiles. These experiments can prove that the cured epoxy resin is very stable, even at a high temperature of 200 ℃, there are few volatiles, and the general application will not have such a high temperature. We have also placed the cured epoxy resin in a high-temperature experiment (200℃/30 days) for a long time. We found that the color of the epoxy resin will turn yellow and dark, but it will never spontaneously ignite for no reason.
─Author: Ms. Su-Yuan, Li Assistant R&D Engineer, Everwide Chemical
Activity § Provide education and training to improve employee quality
Every year, Everwide Chemical will actively arrange for employees to take different training courses. In addition to regularly arranging internal training courses every week, we also often sent them to take the outside training courses. The external training of the R&D department is mainly about professional knowledge. The external training of the manufacturing department is to learn work skills of production technology. Training institutions include Science Construction Management Consulting Company, China Productivity Center, Yunlin County SME Service Center, etc. The course topics have time management, 5S, improvement skills, work planning, etc. As of the end of May, more than 90 employees have been trained. In the second half of the year, relevant personnel will be successively arranged for external education and training to cultivate the overall atmosphere of employees and improve effectiveness! The picture on the left is a handout for external training. We hope that the colleagues who receive external training from the company can absorb the experience and knowledge and can exert an influence on the work. Please encourage each other to make work more efficient!
Knowledge § When the reaction rate is too slow, can we increase the amount of curing agent used to increase the reaction rate?
Question: Epoxy resin : hardener is 100 : 50. When the reaction rate is too slow, can we increase the amount of hardener used to increase the reaction rate? Answer: No. The ratio between the epoxy resin and hardener is calculated, and this ratio only allows a part of the error value. Randomly changing the ratio exceeding the allowable error value will cause the properties of the cured product to deteriorate. Moreover, increasing the amount of curing agent used does not necessarily make the curing speed of the epoxy resin faster. The system that can increase the reaction rate by increasing the amount of hardener is an unsaturated polyester (UP), which is a free-radical polymerization system.
Living § Cultivate your worldview
"The capital of the United Kingdom is London, and the capital of France is Paris. Where is the capital of the United States?" This question has baffled many high school students, and their answer is "The capital of the United States is New York!" That is wrong! If you know that the capital of the United States is Washington, now I ask you where is Kiribati, one of Taiwan’s diplomatic countries? I believe most people don't know the answer. Kiribati is close to Australia. It is located in the Pacific Ocean and is the island nation of the Central Pacific. It is also the only country in the world that straddles the eastern and western hemispheres and the northern and southern hemispheres at the same time. The part of the yellow block in the left picture is the country of Kiribati. There have been articles on the Internet that ironically: People with narrow worldview now. While many parents are actively cultivating and educating the next generation, should they also know more about the worldview? Language is the most important tool for cultivating a worldview. English is the first choice for many languages. How to learn English well is a common problem for many people. I was traveling to Singapore and Malaysia this year, and I found that the people of these two countries have good English skills, and they can even talk without thinking. On the other hand, my language ability, under the excuse of busywork, has gradually regressed a lot. How to improve our language ability is the question of many people. It is a good way to use your spare time to read English newspapers and magazines and listen to English radio. I occasionally rent a DVD to practice my English listening skills and this is also a good choice. However, English is just one of the tools for everyone to move towards the world. How can we cultivate our own worldview? Which is also a problem that everyone needs to face. Buying a globe and learning more geographic knowledge, or watching international news in the world, also can cultivate our worldview. While actively taking steps to be in line with international standards, don't forget to close the distance with the world.
─Author: Ms. Heng-Rong, Li Representative of Document Management, Everwide Chemical
