Fingerprinting resin cure with dielectric analysis

This paper describes a unique new approach to characterizing polymer cure by monitoring the accompanying changes in dielectric properties. The instrument, called AUDREY®² (short for Automatic DielecRomEtrY) uses a capacitative probe to track the cure characteristics. Hence, dielectric analysis can be performed either on materials in a standard test cell for qualifying incoming resins or, alternately, in dies and molds so that it can be used for on-line measurement of these materials during their final forming operations.