Development of epoxy resin polishing padsfor glass polishing

Abstract

This paperdescribesnewly developed polishingpadsfor glass finishing that employs an epoxy resin instead ofa conventional polyurethaneresin.The porosity of the polishing pad was controlled by changing the amount of a chemical foaming agents mixed with a prepolymer epoxy resin.It wasfound that the removal rate of glass surface using epoxy polishing pad was approximately two times higher than those using urethane polishing pad, which meansa 50 percent decrease in a usage of CeO2 abrasives.The waviness and edge roll-off of polished glass surfaceswere markedly improved by utilizing epoxy polishing pads, while the surface roughness of glass surfacesfinished by epoxy padswas comparable to thatfinished by urethane pads.The investigation of substitute abrasive materialsexhibitedthat the CeO2 abrasives werecompletely substituted for ZrO2 abrasives.The mechanism of higher removal rate of epoxy polishing padswasalso investigated using measurement of contact angles, sliding angles and dynamic friction coefficient of polishing pads. These measurements indicatethat abrasive grains are supported more strongly on the epoxy polishing pad than on the urethane polishing pad, namely, higher relative velocity between workpiece surface and abrasive grains to be obtained. © 2011 The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers.