Applications

• Adhesives

  FlexiSolv™ products provide an alternative to traditional solvents when slower evaporation is desired. DBE® esters play an important role in adhesive applications. Its miscibility with most organic solvents and solvency for a wide range of resins makes it useful as a cleaning solvent for equipment. It also finds use as a carrier solvent in solvent-borne adhesive systems requiring a slow evaporating solvent in adhesive formulations. DBE® esters can often be used as an effective alternative for solvents such as methylene chloride, MEK, 1,1,1-trichloroethane, xylene, toluene, and acetone in adhesives applications.

• Agricultural Carrier Solvent

  DBE® is a viable alternative to traditional aromatic solvents. Solvents are often used to transport active ingredients literally into the field, either in a concentrated form or let down in water. The traditional solvents for this application include certain aromatic solvents. DBE® esters are a good choice when reformulation becomes necessary.

• Cleaners

  The range of solubility characteristics found in the family of FlexiSolv™ products provides flexibility in how you meet your cleaning requirements. Whether you are a formulator of cleaning products or an end-user in an industrial setting, there is a FlexiSolv™ product for you. Our new line of microemulsions greatly expands our offering for water-based cleaning solutions. The ability of DBE® esters to dissolve many industrial soils makes it the product of choice in many areas where cleaning is needed. Examples of application areas are in resin clean-up, paint booth cleaning, degreasing, industrial cleaning, graffiti and hand-cleaning in an industrial setting. The low miscibility of DBE® esters with water makes for easy separation from effluent, and recycling if required.

• Coatings

  The combination of excellent solvency and slow evaporation enable FlexiSolv™ products to perform well as a “tails” solvent in coating formulations for a range of applications including coil/can coatings, industrial coatings, decorative/architectural coatings, and inks.

• Foundry Core Binders / Silicate Binders

  Resins that hold together the sand in a metal casting mould are called Foundry Core Binders. DBE® esters are being used more and more as they provides significant advantages in these formulations, for example giving increased working time of the mix, and increased tensile strength of the cured shape. DBE® esters are a viable alternative to many of the traditional aromatic solvents, especially in cold-box systems, which are becoming more prevalent as the complexity of shapes increases.

• Oilfield Chemicals

  DBE® esters may be used to dissolve additives used in oil extraction processes. Many chemicals are injected into oil wells and pipelines to aid the extraction of oil. The oil-bearing rock is deep in the Earth's hot crust. Oil is transported to the surface, often via pipes running through icy waters. To extract the oil and transport it to the surface for separation complex additive systems are required. These are often dissolved in solvents. DBE® esters can be effective solvents in some cases.

• Paint Strippers

  Combining excellent solvency, compatibility with other solvents, and a desirable regulatory profile, FlexiSolv™ products are an effective alternative to other paint stripping solvents. Our new line of microemulsions is ideally suited for water-dilutable, water-rinseable stripping solutions.

• Pharmaceutical and Agricultural Chemicals

  The fractions of DBE® esters provide a useful source of C4-C6 di-esters. The fractions of DBE® esters provide a useful source of C4-C6 di-esters or di-acids. Some of the fractions can act as an intermediate in the manufacture of pesticides.

• Pigments

  DBE®-4 esters is a starting material for making DMSS, a precursor to quinacridone pigment.

• Plasticizers

  DBE® esters may be used in both permanent and fugitive plasticizers. Plasticizers are usually short-chain polymers in a resin which interfere with the hardening process. They can be soft segments in the polymer backbone (permanent plasticizers), but are usually separate molecules between the polymer chains, so-called fugitive plasticizers. They are typically esters of branched isomers of C8, 9 & 10 mono alcohols.

• Polyurethane Polyols

  DBE® esters can be reacted with excess glycols to make polyesters polyols. Polyesters polyols based on DBE® esters are used to make PU elastomers, coatings and both flexible and rigid foams.

• Recycling Solvent

  DBE® esters dissolve many different resins and certain plastics such as polystyrene making it an attractive solvent for many plastics recycling applications. Partial solubility in water can lead to precipitation options for polymer recovery in an aqueous phase, and DBE® esters themselves can be recovered by vacuum distillation.

• Soil Stabilization

  DBE® esters functions as a hardener in sodium silicate binder systems. Chemical grouting is the practice of injecting a solution into soil to reinforce and stabilize soils and/or increase their load carrying capabilities. This is why grouting is often used as a construction aid. Sodium silicate and a hardener (based on DBE® esters) form such a grouting system. This reaction is analogous to the formation of natural sandstone, which is formed by gluing together loose sand with silicate.

• Wet Strength Paper Resins

  DBE®-5 esters can be used in producing polymers to improve paper’s strength and durability. Wet strength paper resins (WSPR) are polymers added to the wet end of the paper making process in order to bind together pulp fiber such that tear strength and wear/abrasion resistance are retained if the finished paper is wetted. Typical applications include paper towels, paper plates and cups, maps and fine writing papers.

• d-Limonene Alternative

• Methylene Chloride Alternative