Scientists at Michelman, Inc. are using a rotational rheometer from Malvern Instruments to tailor products for the exacting demands of the company’s diverse customer base.

Scientists at Michelman, Inc., a global supplier of water-based surface modifiers, polymers and coatings, are using a rotational rheometer from Malvern Instruments to tailor products for the exacting demands of the company’s diverse customer base. Through detailed characterization of the rheological response of a formulation, the team can develop cost-effective coating solutions that behave in a well-defined way during storage, application and drying.

“The Malvern rheometer is an extremely important asset for Michelman Inc,” comments Senior Research Chemist Ron Foster. “‘It allows us to measure the viscosity of coatings at different shear rates and then confidently predict stability, ease of application and leveling behavior. The melting oven is a valuable accessory that allows us to assess polymer feeds in wax emulsions. Malvern’s technical support is excellent, particularly with respect to interpreting results, and has helped us to extract maximum value from the instrument.”

During storage, coatings are subjected only to gravitational forces, but during application, high-shear conditions may be imposed. As the coating dries to form a level surface with the desired attributes, very low-shear conditions apply once more. Michelman takes advantage of the oscillatory testing capabilities and wide torque of the rheometer to quantify formulation performance under all relevant conditions and ensure it will fully meet customer specifications. These capabilities simplify the replacement of existing commercial products with, for example, more environmentally benign, water-based alternatives.

Malvern Rheometers

The Malvern rheology offering is much more than a suite of high-performance precision instruments with applications in research, development and QC. Malvern understands that for many people, rheology is a complicated subject and is simply a means to an end. To address this issue Malvern has developed Kinexus, a radically new rheometer platform whose embedded intelligence makes it much easier for users to access appropriate rheological information.

Kinexus is a unique rheometer designed for tomorrow’s rheology needs across all industries and application areas. Designed from the ground up, the Kinexus rheology platform is the result of more than four years of intensive product development. Kinexus enables you to precisely analyze the rheology, or flow and deformation properties of your materials:

• from liquids to solids;
  
• from processability to product performance;
  
• from temperature to time dependence; and
  
• from simple viscosity to complex viscoelastic parameters.
  

For more information, visit www.malvern.com/kinexus.