Synthesis and characterization of phenol‐urea‐formaldehyde foaming resin used to block air leakage in mining

Abstract

In this study, phenol, urea, and paraformaldehyde were used as the monomers for the one‐step synthesis of phenol‐urea‐formaldehyde (PUF) foaming resin that was used to block air leakage in mining. An orthogonal test was used to study the effects of urea amount, catalyst amount, reaction temperature, and reaction time on the foaming property of the resin. The results showed that the optimum parameters for synthesizing PUF resin are as follows: 1 mol phenol, 0.5 mol urea, 3 mol formaldehyde equivalents of paraformaldehyde, and 0.05 mol catalyst at 75°C for 3 h. The infrared and 13C nuclear magnetic resonance spectra of the PUF resin showed that the chemical structure of the PUF resin was significantly different from that of phenol‐formaldehyde resin, indicating that a copolymerization reaction has occurred among the three components, that is, phenol, urea, and paraformaldehyde. In this study, PUF foam was prepared from catalysts and PUF resin. The results showed that the foaming capacity and oxygen index of the PUF foam were significantly improved by using urea, whereas the shrinking percentage decreased with no change in compression strength. POLYM. COMPOS., 35:2056–2066, 2014. © 2014 Society of Plastics Engineers