Polyacrylate emulsion containing IBOMA for removable pressure sensitive adhesives

ABSTRACT In the area of pressure sensitive adhesives (PSAs), corona treatment or other preprocessing on the carrier was commonly utilized for the enhancement of the interaction between the adhesive layer and the carrier, with complicated procedures and operations. To make it easy, one‐pot emulsion polymerization using n‐butyl acrylate, isobornyl methacrylate (IBOMA), 2‐hydroxyethyl acrylate and acrylic acid was conducted in the presence of a reactive emulsifier SR‐20 to obtain a reinforced adhesive tape. First, the emulsion had good stabilities, especially freeze‐thaw stability, which was helpful to the fabrication of PSAs. Second, IBOMA increased the binding strength between adhesive layer and adherend. The properties of the final tapes well fulfilled the requirements of this areas, such as that the 180° peel strength of 125.9 N/m when coated on non‐corona surfaces, the tack of 19 #, and the shear holding time of more than 100 h. Third, the tapes produced using the above emulsion could be removed many times, with no PSAs residue on the adherend even when coated on untreated PP, which showed the potential of recycling and environmental protection. Thus, these properties make the polyacrylate emulsion have great potential for practical applications. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2016 , 133 , 42886.