High speed compression of highly filled thin composites: Effect of binder content and stiffness

A novel platen press has been utilized to study the effect of binder stiffness and content on the high speed compression behavior of the paper coating composites. Coatings consisting of four different styrene-butadiene latex binders with different glass transition temperatures were tested in this study. Also, the response of structures containing 5, 10, 12 and 15.5 pph of latex will be discussed. Furthermore, experimental results will be compared to simulation results obtained by discrete element models (DEMs), which are created based on the micro-properties of each component. DEM was capable of predicting both the trends and the quantitative changes in the responses of the structures under compressive force. It was also noted that as the density of the composite structure increased with increasing latex concentration, the stiffness of coating structures increases. This highlights the influence of voids on the stress transfer within the structures. The results of this study provide insight into the compression and smoothening phenomena of different paper coatings during calendering and fusing processes. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.