Epoxy-based liquid crystalline coatings

Liquid crystalline epoxy resins display properties which make them suitable for coating application. In fact, they exhibit superior fracture resistance, low coefficient of thermal expansion, good bonier properties and good heat and solvent stability. Moreover, the onset during the curing reaction of the liquid crystalline phase, creates on increase in the reaction rate which could lower the reaction times or temperature, whilst increasing the conversion obtained on curing. In this paper, an account is presented of the properties exhibited by these materials.