Recycling of bio-polyurethane foam using high power ultrasound

Abstract

Three different types of waste bio-polyurethane foams (bio-PUFs) made of castor oil-based polyol, castor oil-based polyol with isosorbide-based isocyanate, and soybean oil-based polyol were ultrasonically decrosslinked, and blended with a traditional PUF formula for fabrication of automotive seat cushions. The seating comfort of recrosslinked PUFs was quantified by calculating the hardness, hysteresis loss, and sag factor as derived from the indentation force deflection test, and found to exhibit improved seating comfort. In this regard, the ultrasonically decrosslinked bio-PUFs were examined by gel fraction, crosslink density, FT-IR spectroscopy, and thermal property, and the improvement of comfort was attempted to explain by analyzing the morphological changes of recrosslinked PUFs using SEM.