WO2008084375A2

WO2008084375A2 - Coating or flooring element and method for carrying out said element

Info

Publication number: WO2008084375A2
Application number: PCT/IB2008/000024
Authority: WO
Inventors: Max Canti
Original assignee: Labicer-Laboratorio Industrial Ceramico, S.A.
Priority date: 2007-01-08
Filing date: 2008-01-08
Publication date: 2008-07-17
Also published as: WO2008084375A3; ITPS20070003A1

Abstract

A coating or flooring element comprises at least vegetable products or their by-products in a hardened resinous substance.

Description

COATING OR FLOORING ELEMENT AND METHOD FOR CARRYING OUT SAID ELEMENT

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present invention refers to coating or flooring elements and panels, as an example for parquet and the like, and in particular it concerns a coating or flooring element and a method for carrying out said element.

BACKGROUND ART

The low resistance of the wood parquets and of the parquets made of faced HDF to the trampling and to the contusion of fallen objects and to the rolling of the office chairs wheels, and the deformations consequent to accidental flooding are known and said low resistance and deformations oblige to use wood floor only in particular zones of the house.

DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION

The main object of the present invention is to propose a flooring element which has both the advantages of the wood ones, referring in particular to the possibility to walk barefoot thereon without feeling cold, differently from the marble and ceramic floor, and the high resistance to water and to trampling typical of the ceramics and marbles, in order to be used in substitution thereof.

Another object is to propose a water resistant element, to be used in several applications, like, as an example, panels for winnowed or not winnowed roof tiles, which do not need protective waterproof sheath, street furniture, container or truck goods or train platforms, pleasure-boat or ship wharfs, bulkhead or furniture thereof, swimming pools boundaries floor, bathroom coatings and floors, garden furniture, bungalows, prefabricated wood houses, winnowed walls, shelters, grazing animals housings, sound insulating barriers, guardrails with low landscape environmental impact, beach furniture, terrace and balcony floors, gym floors, raised floors etc..

Another object is to propose a material, differently from the wood parquet and to the conglomerate floors, lacking in formaldehyde, phenol, styrol urea, which are cancerogenous both in the forming step and for the whole life time of the finished products, thus proposing a biocompatible product.

Another object is to use local resources fit only to the waste-to-energy process, in a more profitable manner, and respecting the natural environment.

BEST MODE OF CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION

The raw materials used for carrying out the element of the present invention is a vegetable product or a plurality of vegetable products or the by-products thereof, like a wood whose oil content make it waterproof, olives stones, walnuts or almonds shells, coconut shells, residual of the extraction of the oil from seeds, or wood fibres with high silicon contents, rice glumes and glumelles, reeds and bamboos, the mud of the beer fermentation and other types of woods or seeds, made waterproof by impregnation.

The first step consists in chopping up wood fibres, in order to make them have a granulometry fit to carry out a perfectly closed conglomerate. Then the chopping up is followed by a mixing step with unsaturated fatty acid (preferably linseed oil) in small percentages (up to 3-10% preferably about 5 %) and then with an organic ligand polyurethane bicomponent in a measure ranging from 5 to 20%, preferably 10%.

The mixture is then deposited in an uniform layer onto a moulding support, for example comprising a conveyor belt, and pre-compacted under several contrasting rolls where the lower rolls are placed on the same plane under the conveyor belt and the upper rolls are placed in a tilted plane in the advancing direction, then a predetermined blade portion of the mixture is picked up from the conveyor by means of a sucking plane provided with perimetrical punch and said portion is deposited onto a flat mortarboard, or tray, provided with a detaching agent.

This mortarboard is placed between the planes of a multi-opening press whose characteristic is to provide a continuous step process thanks to the possibility to open a space while the others are kept in pressure, allowing the product to stay for the relatively long period of time needed to the complete polymerization of the bicomponent ligand.

Alternatively it is possible to deposit a layer and pre-compact the mixture directly onto the mortarboard and introduce it in a press avoiding the transfer thereof.

The planes of the press, covered by a detaching agent like the Mayler film, are heated to speed up the polymerization time that will be much short in function of the supplied temperatures, as an example for temperatures ranging from about 60° C and about 70° C there will be polymerization time ranging from 15 to 20 minutes, for temperatures of about 200° C the polymerization time is about three minutes.

Choosing the option of the high temperatures the method becomes highly productive also with mono-opening press and still more using a "contirol" press provided with harmonic steel rolling tapes.

In the latter case the depositing of the mixture blade is carried out directly onto the Mayler conveyor tape in line that overflows both at the inlet and the outlet of the continuous press avoiding the pre-compacting and the transferring of the mixture blade and the mortarboard comebacks, obtaining the continuous forming which will be separated with an in running cutting in order to obtain a predefined size at the outlet of the press.

The surface fit to the gluing in the laying may be carried out with grooves prints, also orthogonally placed, in order to make the gluing easier, predisposing the mortarboards with said prints, in the same manner an in view surface with bass-relief having a decorative or anti-slipping effect may be obtained. To brightening up the decorative aspect, coarse-grain fragments of colored wood or other coarse-grain fragments of organic materials like colored plastic materials or light reflecting materials as CD, mother-of-pearl fragments, and bleaching or coloring oxides may be included in the mixture.

The conglomerate panels or elements are finished with a proper smoothing, in order to highlight the inclusions, waxing or overlapping with a fireproofed transparent paint of high resistance to the abrasion (PEI 4) and which cannot be soiled by any agent.

Particularly a superficial decoration may be carried out by digital printing both onto the flat surface or onto the surface with relieves, or by other systems in order to confer any desired aspect, comprising the high-fidelity reproductions of precious woods or briar- roots, or by means of the printing used in ceramics, and subsequent overlapping with transparent fireproofed paint.

The main advantage of such wood flooring or covering is the possibility of laying also onto non perfectly dried block of stones or the laying onto cement mortars as used for the stone materials.

Another advantage is the laying without adhesives of floating flooring with joints without the danger of disagreeable shrinkages or deformations.

The use of the unsatured fatty acid, preferably linseed oil, enriches the oily wood, making it more water-repellent, and in the case of the already water-proofed fibres rich in silicon or other hygroscopic, or porous and fit to keep or absorb humidity, wood fibres, they are impregnated and made water-repellent.

The use of the bicomponent polyurethane ligand resin, or of a resinous substance which may be hardened, allows to bind, contrary to the other used ligands, the fibres impregnated with unsatured fatty acid, while it would act as a detaching agent for them, it forms with the second component of the polyurethane resin (the polyalcohol), insoluble and steady polyesters. The possible linseed oil excess crystallizes on the surface onto the fibres by subsequent oxidation.

Exploiting said ligand property also hard woods, considered particular waste, may be use, like railway wood crossbars impregnated with creosote which will bind contrarily to the polyalcohol, to the diisocyanate, forming always an insoluble and steady polyester, allowing to recover a great resource fit to a particular disposal.

Using a coarse-grain granulometry of olive stones or coconut shells or other hard seeds it is possible to realize a draining conglomerate to be fitted to the flooring of garden path or pavements or squares.

The proposed objects have been realized carrying out a wood material fit to the flooring in substitution of wood parquet, which derives from the deforestation.

This wood element or material may be applied like the stone materials, usable in substitution of them for the facing or the decoration by printing a subsequent depositing of fireproofed paint which may not be soiled and resistant as a ceramic surface, or other uses, waterproof, lacking in formaldehyde, phenol, monomelic styrol fumes both in the forming step regarding the worker and in the finished product regarding the customers, using rich local resources not yet exploited, respecting the environment.

Claims

1) Coating or flooring element characterized in that it comprises at least vegetable products or their by-products in a hardened resinous substance.

2) Element according to claim 1 characterized in that the vegetables products comprise at least one among woods, oil seeds, olive stones or similar, walnuts or coconut or almonds or of other origins shells, residual of the extraction of the oil from seeds, fibre materials and/or materials containing silicon, rice glumes and glumelles, reeds or bamboos, mud of the beer fermentation, wood particles also highly hygroscopic, or combination thereof.

3) Element according to claim 1 or claim 2 characterized in that it comprises unsatured fatty acids, preferably linseed oil, applied to or adsorbed by hygroscopic vegetable products.

4) Element according to claim 3 characterized in that the vegetable products are water- repellent and/or made water-repellent by the unsatured fatty acids.

5) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that the vegetable products are chopped up with granulometry ranging between 0,01 mm and 5 mm.

6) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that the vegetable products are chip and/or fragment and/or splinter and/or sliver shaped.

7) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that the resinous substance comprises at least a bicomponent polyurethane resin.

8) Element according to claim 3 characterized in that the unsatured fatty acids range between 2% and 15%, preferably about 5% of the hygroscopic vegetable products.

9) Element according to claim 7 characterized in that it comprises the bicomponent polyurethane resin in percentage ranging between 4% and 25%, preferably about 10%.

10) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that it includes at least one among colored wood fragments, other materials as plastic material, mother-of-pearl, light reflecting fragments like glitters and/or recycled CDs, various inorganic products, metals, natural or inorganic fibres, foam glass, colorant and bleaching oxides.

1 1) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that it has the not in view surface shaped with grooves, as an example orthogonally placed.

12) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that it has the in view surface bas-relief shaped with a decorative or anti-slipping effect.

13) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that the in view surface of the element is smoothed, polished, embossed or glazed.

14) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that at least the in view surface comprises a facing or decorative layer, like a printed layer and/or a layer of decorative paper and/or laminated plastic.

15) Element according to claim 14 characterized in that the decorative paper is of the impregnated with melamine type.

16) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that it comprises fireproofing agents as, for instance, ammonium phosphate or aluminum hydrate.

17) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that the vegetable products are of the fireproof treated type, as an example impregnated with salts fit to fix themselves in insoluble way onto the cellular walls. 18) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that it has one or both the surfaces treated with transparent fireproof paint, the vegetable products are of the fireproofed type, which cannot be soiled with any agent.

19) Element according to any of the previous claims characterized in that the volume of its resin is lower n respect to the volume of the interspaces among the vegetable products in order to obtain a draining function.

20) Element according to claim 19 characterized in that said vegetable products have granulometry of coarse-grain dimension and comprise coarse grain particles of olive stones or coconut shells.

21) Method for obtaining the element of any of the previous claims characterized in that it comprises at least the steps of: - chopping up and/or granulometrically selecting a predetermined quantity of vegetable products; - mixing said vegetable products at least with a resinous substance up to obtain mixture thereof; depositing a layer of said mixture onto a moulding support; - hardening the resinous substance obtaining the element comprising the vegetable products in a resinous matrix.

22) Method according to claim 21 characterized in that it comprises at least a step of impregnating said vegetable products with an unsatured fatty acid, preferably linseed oil, before mixing with the resinous substance.

23) Method according to claim 21 or 22 characterized in using vegetable products being chip and/or fragment and/or splinter and/or sliver shaped.

24) Method according to any of the claims 21-23 characterized in that it comprises at least a fϊreproofϊng treatment step of said vegetable products before the mixing with the resinous substance. 25) Method according to claim 24 characterized in that the fireproofing step consists at least in impregnating said vegetable products with salts fit to fix themselves in an insoluble way onto the cellular walls.

26) Method according to any of the claims 21-25 characterized in using as vegetable products at least one among woods, oil seeds, olive stones or similar, walnuts or coconut or almonds or of other origins shells, residual of the extraction of the oil from seeds, fibre materials and/or material containing silicon, rice glumes and glumelles, reeds and bamboos, mud of the beer fermentation, wood particles also highly hygroscopic, or combination thereof.

27) Method according to any of the claims 21-26 characterized in using as resinous substance at least a polyurethane bicomponent resin.

28) Method according to any of the claims 21-27 characterized in impregnating the hygroscopic vegetable products with at least unsatured fatty acids, preferably linseed oil.

29) Method according to claims 27 and 28 characterized in using unsatured fatty acid ranging between 2% and 15%, preferably about 5% of the hygroscopic vegetable products and the bicomponent polyurethane resin ranging between 4% and 25%, preferably about 10%.

30) Method according to any of the claims 21-29 characterized in introducing in the mixture at least one among colored wood fragments, other materials as plastic material, mother-of-pearl, light reflecting fragments like glitters and/or recycled CDs, various inorganic products, metals, natural or inorganic fibres, foam glass, colorant and bleaching oxides.

31) Method according to any of the claims 21-30 characterized in depositing the mixture in such a way to form a uniform layer onto a conveyor detaching belt. 32) Method according to claim 31 characterized in pressing the mixture making it match with ring-like closed and heated steel tapes, of a continuous press.

33) Method according to any of the claims 21-30 characterized in depositing the mixture layer onto a conveyor tape, pre-compacting it and transfer it onto a mortarboard or tray provided with sucking plane and having perimetrical punch.

34) Method according to claim 33 characterized in pressing the mixture layer onto the mortarboard or tray placing said mortarboard or tray between the planes of a multi- opening press, said planes being heated at a temperature ranging between 60°C and 100°C, or a mono-opening press with planes heated at a temperature of about 200°C.

35) Method according to any of the claims 21-34 characterized in smoothing the element obtained after its hardening.

36) Method according to any of the claims 21-35 characterized in providing the moulding support with a shaping die or with decorative or anti-slipping high- relieves.

37) Method according to any of the claims 21-36 characterized in facing and or decorating one or both the surfaces of the element by printing, as an example of the transfer type or by applying impregnated decorative papers or plastic laminated, or by directly forming onto the element a plastic laminated at low static pressure or in continuous press, or forming the laminated simultaneously to the forming step of the element by directly overlapping the impregnated with melamine decorative paper and possible melamine overlay using a flat or structural finishing or release embossing films.