• Zhang, Xuelian
  University of Maine Graduate School
  

The overall goal of this dissertation was to improve the resin efficiency in the manufacturing process of wood strand-based composites through controlling the characteristics of resin adhesive spray to produce a uniform droplet size and narrow size distribution. Current lack of corresponding research on the characteristics of resin-adhesive spray for maximum resin efficiency inspired the following research: 1) Comprehensive review of the empirical droplet size and size distribution of resin-adhesives in wood composite production; 2) Application of a laser diffraction analyzer to characterize wood resin-adhesive spray; 3) Characterizing the spray pattern and mechanism of spinning disk atomization of wood resin-adhesives; 4) Application of a novel spray method, ultrasonic atomization, to generate wood resin-adhesive spray; 5) Investigation of extensional properties of wood resin-adhesives.