Industrial Adhesives

Adhesive is defined as a thing, which is used to bond or fasten any two or more materials. Such materials have a huge demand in industries, especially the manufacturing sector. Adhesives used for domestic purpose are simply termed as adhesives, while those used in industrial application are more categorically termed as industrial adhesives. Industrial adhesives serve a very different function than the regular use adhesives. Such adhesives need to be tougher, should be able o bind in certain harsh conditions, and even bind materials that are not very easy to bind using common adhesives. Various types of adhesives used in industries are epoxies, hot melt, sealants, acrylics, thermostat and silicon adhesives.

In previous times (early use of adhesives has been found 6000 years back), natural adhesives were used, which were obtained or developed form vegetable, animal hide and skin, as well as mineral sources. However, the focus has now turned to more synthetic adhesives, and these are widely used in industries, the reason being better bonding properties, easy mass manufacturing availability, which also leads to lowering cost of such adhesives.

Different kinds of adhesives have different bonding properties, which can be used for specific purposes. While some have very good bonding properties, others can be used under certain difficult conditions, where regular adhesives cannot be used. Some adhesives are specifically used to bond particular type of materials, like metals. Hot metal adhesives, epoxy adhesives, polyurethane adhesives, sealants are some of the adhesives widely used for bonding metals.

Hot metal adhesives are the types of adhesives suitable when you need to use it repetitively. They can be alternately hardened and softened by repetitive cooling and heating. Pressure-sensitive adhesives are those, which require only a slight pressure to form a good bond. Such adhesives are available in water, solvent and latex based forms to use under different specific conditions. UV curing adhesives are another specialized kind of adhesives that require no heat, but only exposure to UV rays (which is abundant during daytime due to sunlight), or some other kind of radiation, to form a strong and permanent bond. Such adhesives come with different setting time, with some bonding instantly, while others taking a longer time to form a strong bond.

Adhesives such as acrylic, silicone, rubber and polyurethane are chemical based in comparison to the more widely used resin based adhesives. Acrylic adhesives have a very less setting time as compared to most resins. Polyurethane is highly durable and flexible, and also offers very high resistance to impact, making it the most widely used industrial adhesive.

Rubber adhesives are based on compounds like nitrile or butyl, and these offer very strong bond between surfaces, which are still highly flexible. Epoxy adhesives can withstand environmental and chemical damages and are widely used in places where the joint is likely to be exposed to atmosphere all its functional life, or maybe exposed to harsh chemicals.