Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research, Vol.59, No.25, 11381-11388, 2020
3D Printing of a Dual-Curing Resin with Cationic Curable Vegetable Oil
The development and fabrication of high-performance renewable 3D objects with moderate elongation and high mechanical strength via 3D printing are highly desirable in the ongoing transition toward a circular economy. Her; urethane epoxidized soybean oil (SBO-URE) was compounded with acrylates to obtain hybrid resins for stereolithographic 3D printing. The photoinitiated process of the printing formulation was investigated by real-time FT-IR. After printing, the part was thermally cured at an elevated temperature to yield an interpenetrating network (IPN). The effects of postcuring and the SBO-URE content on the printed objects were investigated by a series of tests. The results showed that the addition of SBO-URE can increase mechanical strength without seriously sacrificing the elongation, revealing that the IPN structure offers certain improvement in the general properties. In addition, the hybrid resins lead to high-resolution prototypes with a complex microarchitecture and excellent surface finishing, indicating that sustainable bio-based resins can be applied in stereolithographic 3D printing.