Dismantling of Polymer Adhesives Using Physical Stimuli

Polymer adhesives are widely used to assemble various materials in products. For recycling, highly efficient and selective methods to disassemble the materials are required. In this review, debonding methods of polymer adhesives using physical stimuli, such as electrical pulsed discharge, microwave and induction heating, are presented. Electrical pulsed discharge method is a promising technique to debond polymeric adhesives from metals for material recycling. In this approach, a pulsed discharge with a high voltage is applied to the system over a short time, then thermal stress and rapid expansion of gasified materials leads to debond the adherend material. To achieve successful debonding, the addition of conducting fillers, such as carbon black, was effective. Microwave and induction heating can selectively raise the temperature of certain materials, such as semiconductive silicon cell and metal in polymeric materials, respectively. These localized heating methods can debond the polymer adhesive more quickly with less energy consumption than heating the entire product. These methods input a large amount of energy locally and can be applied to the dismantling of stronger structural adhesives in a variety of products, including electric vehicles parts, photovoltaic panels and polymer/metal insert moldings.