The Goodyear & Tire Rubber Company

Robert Donald Mate

Gary Lee Burroway

Lance Walter Lewis

John Charles Ullemeyer

Dane Kenton Parker

James C Blackwell

A process for finishing latex to form a dry resin and the resulting product. The process includes coagulating a latex of a thermoplastic polymer at a temperature at or just above the agglomeration temperature of the resin, dewatering the resin slurry to form a resin cake, drying the resin cake using extrusion technology to form a resin melt and solidifying the resin melt to form the resin. Preferred processes of the invention also include finishing the resin, such as by pelletizing and/or grinding it. More preferred processes of the invention include collecting and neutralizing the aqueous liquid byproducts from the dewatering and drying steps of the process. One embodiment of the invention includes utilizing water to solidify the resin melt, pelletizing the resin and drying the pellets. Most preferred processes of the invention include recycling any aqueous liquid byproducts of the solidifying and/or pellet drying steps, and recycling dried resin that is outside of the specification back into the resin cake drying step. Dried resins of the invention can have a moisture of not greater than 1.0% by weight and a residuals concentration of not greater than 500 ppm.

Dry resin made from an emulsion polymerized thermoplastic latex

Process for finishing a resin from an emulsion polymerized latex

This invention is based upon the discovery that the characteristics of toner resins made by emulsion polymerization can be improved by utilizing amino acid soaps. Such amino acid soaps are typically salts of alkyl sarcosinates, such as ammonium lauryl sarcosinate and sodium lauryl sarcosinate. Toner resins which are made utilizing such amino acid surfactants do not exhibit significant electrical charge effects from the residual level of amino acid soap in the resin compared to resins made using other soap types, such as rosin acid soaps, fatty acid soaps, and the like. They also generally contain a lower level of ash since salts do not need to be used in their coagulation. As a result of the low level of ash, the toner resin made from the amino acid soap exhibits excellent resistance to moisture sensitivity and adsorption. This feature gives the toners made from these resins better electrical charge stability compared to resins made from other soaps since adsorbed moisture is known to neutralize electrical charges. This invention more specifically discloses a process for preparing a polymer which is particularly useful as a toner resin, which comprises (1) emulsion copolymerizing a vinyl aromatic monomer and a second monomer selected from the group consisting of conjugated diene monomers and an acrylate monomer selected from the group consisting of alkyl acrylate monomers and methacrylate monomers in the presence of an amino acid soap to produce the polymer; and (2) recovering the polymer from the aqueous emulsion.

Process for producing toner resin with amino acid soaps

The present invention relates to a process for preparing a polymeric resin which contains repeat units which are derived from maleic anhydride in an emulsion polymerization process which comprises polymerizing a vinyl aromatic monomer and an alkyl acrylate monomer in an aqueous medium in the presence of a styrene-maleic anhydride seed polymer which is neutralized with a tertiary amine. Such polymers, which contain repeat units which are derived from a vinyl aromatic monomer, an alkyl acrylate monomer, and maleic anhydride, are particularly useful as electrostatic image developing toner resins. For instance, resins, which are comprised of repeat units which are derived from styrene, butyl acrylate, and maleic anhydride, are particularly useful as toner resins.

Emulsion polymerization process

A process for the emulsion copolymerization of functionalized monomers wherein the improvement comprises the use of methyl isobutyl ketone (MIBK) as a solvent and elevated soap levels in the polymerization.

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Stow, OH, United States of America

Robert Donald Mate