JPH06200055A - Prepreg and fiber-reinforced plastic - Google Patents

Abstract

(57) [Summary] [Object] To provide an FRP that is uniformly colored and does not easily fade in color, and a prepreg for producing the FRP. A prepreg having a colored layer formed by spraying a coloring material on the surface of a fiber reinforced prepreg is provided. Further, there is provided a fiber reinforced plastic including at least one formed by curing a fiber reinforced prepreg having a colored layer formed by spraying a coloring material on the surface of the fiber reinforced prepreg.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a prepreg for producing a fiber reinforced plastic, and more particularly to a prepreg for producing a fiber reinforced plastic having an arbitrary color and a fiber reinforced plastic.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, lightweight fiber reinforced plastics (hereinafter sometimes referred to as "FRP") having high mechanical strength have been used for golf club shafts, ski poles, fishing rods, rackets for tennis and badminton, etc. ing. Conventional FRP products are often uncolored, that is, products that utilize the color of the reinforcing fibers as they are. However, it may be desired to color the product in a color other than the color of the reinforcing fibers. For this purpose, the finished FRP is usually painted and colored.
However, the FRP colored by painting has a defect that the color easily peels off. In order to overcome this drawback, a hiding material for hiding the color of the reinforcing fibers,
It has been proposed to include a coloring material in the matrix resin for performing desired coloring. For example, JP-A-3
-119038 discloses a colored prepreg in which a flaky coloring material and a hiding pigment are contained in a matrix resin.

However, in the prior art in which the colorant is mixed in the matrix resin, it is necessary to uniformly disperse the colorant in the resin in order to achieve uniform coloring.
This is not always easy. If the coloring material is unevenly dispersed in the resin, uneven coloring occurs.

[0004]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION Therefore, an object of the present invention is to provide an FRP which is uniformly colored and which does not easily come off.
And to provide a prepreg for manufacturing the same.

As a result of earnest research, the present inventors have found that uniform coloring can be surely performed by spraying a coloring material on the surface of the prepreg, and completed the present invention.

That is, the present invention provides a prepreg having a colored layer formed by spraying a coloring material on the surface of the fiber reinforced prepreg. Further, the present invention provides a fiber reinforced plastic including at least one formed by curing a fiber reinforced prepreg having a colored layer formed by spraying a coloring material on the surface of the fiber reinforced prepreg.

The present invention will be described in more detail below.

The prepreg of the present invention contains reinforcing fibers and a matrix resin, and further has a coloring agent sprayed on the surface thereof. As the reinforcing fiber constituting the prepreg of the present invention, any of those conventionally used for prepregs can be used. For example, as inorganic fibers, glass fibers, carbon fibers, graphite fibers, alumina fibers, boron fibers, titania fibers, silicon carbide fibers, etc .; various natural fibers; as organic synthetic fibers, cellulose derivative fibers, aramid fibers, polyester fibers, polyamide fibers Acrylic fibers, polyethylene fibers, polypropylene fibers and the like; metal fibers such as steel fibers, stainless fibers, tungsten fibers and the like; metal coated inorganic fibers, organic fibers; ceramic coated fibers and the like.
Multiple types of fibers can also be used. The fiber diameter of the reinforcing fiber is not limited at all, and one having an arbitrary thickness can be selected according to the application. Further, the reinforced fiber may have any desired form, such as one in which fibers are aligned in one direction, or a non-woven fabric.

Further, the matrix resin in the prepreg is not limited at all, and any of those conventionally used for prepregs can be adopted.
For example, thermosetting of epoxy resin, phenol resin, alkyd resin, urea-formaldehyde resin, unsaturated polyester resin, aromatic polyamide resin, polyimide resin, polyamide-imide resin, polyester-imide resin, polybenzothiazole resin, silicon resin, etc. Resin (having fluidity before curing); polyethylene, polypropylene, acrylic resin, styrene resin, polyvinyl chloride, ABS resin, styrene-acrylonitrile copolymer, polyamide, polyacetal, polysulfone, polycarbonate, polyphenylene oxide, Thermoplastic resins such as polyether sulfone and polyether ether ketone; polybutadiene, polyisoprene, polychloroprene, styrene-butadiene copolymer, acrylonitrile-butadiene copolymer It can employ synthetic rubber such as silicone rubber and natural rubber, and the like. A plurality of resins may be mixed and used. Other additives may be further added to the matrix resin.

The mixing ratio of the reinforcing fiber and the matrix resin in the prepreg is not particularly limited, but is usually about 80:20 to 20:80 by weight.

In the prepreg of the present invention, a coloring material is sprayed on the surface of the prepreg containing the reinforcing fibers and the matrix resin to form a coloring layer. Preferred examples of the colorant are inorganic white pigments such as titanium dioxide, zinc sulfide, zinc white, lithopone, antimony oxide, lead hydroxycarbonate, lead oxysulfate, alumina powder, silica powder, silica alumina powder; iron oxide, titanium yellow, Inorganic chromatic oxide pigments such as chromium oxide and cobalt blue; cadmium red,
Inorganic sulfide pigments such as cadmium yellow; Inorganic silicate pigments such as ultramarine blue; Inorganic chromate pigments such as yellow lead; Various fine metal powders; Azo pigments, phthalocyanine-based, quinacridone-based, dioxazine-based, perinone-based, anthraquinone-based , Isoindolinone-based, quinophthalone-based, perylene-based organic pigments and metal flakes coloring type, various vapor deposition products,
Examples thereof include glitter color products, but are not limited thereto.

The colorant can be sprayed by dissolving or suspending the colorant as described above in a dispersion medium and spraying it with a sprayer. Examples of such a dispersion medium include low-viscosity epoxy resin and the like. The viscosity of the dispersion medium is preferably 1,000 to 30,000 cps. The concentration of the coloring material in the dispersion medium is not particularly limited, but is usually preferably about 10% to 30% on a weight basis.

The thickness of the colored layer formed by spraying the coloring material is not particularly limited and may be a desired thickness, but it is usually about 5 to 30 μm.

In the prepreg of the present invention, since the coloring material is sprayed onto the surface of the prepreg by spraying, when the prepreg is cured, the coloring material is fixed by the cured matrix resin. Therefore, coloring by applying conventional FRP is applied. The colorant is less likely to come off as compared to. However, if it is desired to prevent the colorant from falling off more completely, the colored layer can be covered with a transparent protective layer. The protective layer is not necessarily a fiber-reinforced resin as long as it has sufficient strength, but a fiber-reinforced resin having transparent reinforcing fibers and a transparent matrix resin is preferable. As the transparent reinforcing fiber, any of those conventionally used for a prepreg can be used, and any of the above-mentioned fibers can be adopted as long as it is transparent. Preferable examples include glass fiber, alumina fiber, thermoplastic resin fiber (polyethylene fiber, polyester fiber, nylon fiber, polyurethane fiber) and the like. Further, the thickness and the form of the reinforcing fiber are not limited at all as in the above. As the transparent matrix resin, any of the resins exemplified in the above description can be preferably used as long as it is transparent, and examples thereof include epoxy resin, unsaturated polyester resin, vinyl ester resin, and urethane. An acrylate resin or the like can be preferably used.

The prepreg of the present invention can be manufactured using, for example, an apparatus as shown in FIG. Reinforcing fibers are fed out from the krill stand 1, and a top coated paper 3 coated with a matrix resin and a base coated paper 4 coated with a matrix resin are unrolled from unwinding rolls 5 and 6, respectively, and hot rolls 7 and 7 'Is pressed to the reinforcing fiber 2. The reinforcing fiber impregnated with the matrix resin in this manner is heated by the hot plate 8, further heated by the hot rolls 9 and 9 ', and then cooled by the cooling plate 10, and the used coated paper is the upper release paper. It is wound on the winding roll 11 and the lower release paper winding roll 12, respectively. The prepreg thus formed then passes under the colorant spraying device 13, where the colorant is sprayed. A colorant tray 14 is provided below this region. The prepreg thus coated with the coloring material passes through the drying zone 15 and is wound by the product winding roll 16. This completes the prepreg of the present invention.

The present invention further provides a fiber reinforced plastic having a colored layer formed by spraying a coloring material on the surface of the fiber reinforced plastic. The fiber-cured plastic of the present invention can be produced by curing the prepreg of the present invention based on a conventional method, and after coating a prepreg not having a colored layer on another prepreg or a core material, the above spray It can also be produced by coloring with the above-mentioned, further coating with the above-mentioned protective layer if desired, and then curing by a conventional method. Furthermore, the prepreg of the present invention can be laminated on another prepreg with the side on which the colorant has been sprayed facing downward and cured to obtain a fiber reinforced plastic. In this aspect, the prepreg itself sprayed with the colorant functions as a protective layer. In this case, the prepreg sprayed with the coloring material is preferably a transparent prepreg reinforced with transparent fibers.

[0017]

INDUSTRIAL APPLICABILITY According to the present invention, FR having uniform coloring
P and a prepreg for producing it were provided.
In the prepreg of the present invention, since the colored layer is formed by spraying, uniform coloring can be surely performed as compared with the case where the coloring material is added to the matrix resin. Further, since the coloring material is sprayed onto the surface of the prepreg, when the prepreg is cured, the coloring material is fixed by the cured matrix resin, so that the coloring material is peeled off as compared with the conventional coloring by applying FRP. It is hard to fall off. Furthermore, in the prepreg of the present invention, since the colored layer is formed on the surface, the hiding property of the layer thereunder is high, and there is also an effect that a hiding material for hiding the color of the reinforcing fiber is unnecessary. It

[0018]

EXAMPLES The present invention will be described more specifically below based on examples. However, the present invention is not limited to the following examples.

Example 1 A prepreg was manufactured using the apparatus shown in FIG. That is, a reinforcing fiber made of glass fiber was impregnated with an epoxy resin, heated and cooled, and then a coloring material was sprayed from a coloring material spraying device. Coloring material is low viscosity epoxy resin (viscosity 2,000 cp
15% by weight of cadmium red was dispersed in s). Next, this was dried and wound to obtain a colored prepreg.

Example 2 A carbon fiber prepreg (matrix resin is epoxy resin) was wound around a mandrel. Next, the prepreg manufactured in Example 1 was wound so that the coloring material was on the outside. Then, taping was applied and cured according to a conventional method. Next, the core was removed, the tape was removed, and the surface was polished to complete a tubular product with a beautifully colored surface.

Example 3 In Example 2, after the colored prepreg was wound, a glass fiber prepreg (matrix resin was epoxy resin) was further wound around the colored prepreg, and the same treatment as in Example 2 was carried out. A tubular product which is colored and whose surface is protected by a transparent prepreg is completed.

Example 4 In Example 2, the prepreg produced in Example 1 was
The colorant was wrapped so that it was on the inside. Thereafter, when the same treatment as in Example 2 was performed, a tubular article which was beautifully colored and whose surface was protected by the colored prepreg itself was completed.

Comparative Example 1 The same operation as in Example 1 was carried out except that the colorant dispersion liquid used in Example 1 was contained in the resin without being sprayed. Uneven coloring was observed on the surface of the obtained tubular product.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a diagram schematically showing an apparatus for producing a prepreg of the present invention.

Claims (2)

[Claims] 1. A prepreg having a colored layer formed by spraying a coloring material on the surface of a fiber reinforced prepreg. 2. A fiber reinforced plastic containing at least one formed by curing a fiber reinforced prepreg having a colored layer formed by spraying a coloring material on the surface of the fiber reinforced prepreg.