Kinetic Analysis of the Curing of a Partially Biobased Epoxy Resin Using Dynamic Differential Scanning Calorimetry

This research presents a cure kinetics study of an epoxy system consisting of a partially bio-sourced resin based on diglycidyl ether of bisphenol A (DGEBA) with amine hardener and a biobased reactive diluent from plants representing 31 wt %. The kinetic study has been carried out using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) under non-isothermal conditions at different heating rates. Integral and derivative isoconversional methods or model free kinetics (MFK) have been applied to the experimental data in order to evaluate the apparent activation energy, E(a), followed by the application of the appropriate reaction model. The bio-sourced system showed activation energy that is independent of the extent of conversion, with E(a) values between 57 and 62 kJ·mol(−1), corresponding to typical activation energies of conventional epoxy resins. The reaction model was studied by comparing the calculated y(α) and z(α) functions with standard master plot curves. A two-parameter autocatalytic kinetic model of Šesták–Berggren [SB(m,n)] was assessed as the most suitable reaction model to describe the curing kinetics of the epoxy resins studied since it showed an excellent agreement with the experimental data.