EGE Kimya, which has manufactured metal carboxylates for over fourty years has concentrated its R&D efforts to come up with a product that will be as effective as cobalt octoate, but that will not share the same level of health concerns. The solution was EGECat® Prime.
EGECat® Prime is a cobalt carboxylate offered in a polymeric form. The polymeric structure decreases the water solubility of cobalt ion significantly, while maintaining all other performance characteristics unchanged. With all the benefits of reduced health and environment risks, EGECat Prime still performs at the level of traditional cobalt octoates. Tests carried out on different UPR resin systems with a variety of initiators showed that there are no pronounced differences of EGECat Prime and traditional cobalt accelerators.
The good news is that replacing a traditional cobalt octoate with EGECat Prime does not require any reformulation. Since the good old cobalt does the job, gel time, peak time, peak temperature, hardness and color do not change. It is true that EGECat Prime is a polymer and has a higher viscosity compared to traditional cobalt accelerators. However, this does not become an issue while mixing this new accelerator into the UPR.
EGECat® Prime gave similar performance results with any initiator tried in the lab. It goes without saying that every formulation has to be tested for performance before replacing the old cobalt driers. It is most probable that EGECat Prime will deliver the expected performance.
EGECat Prime®, urethanized cobalt polymer offered in hexylene glycol with 4 % cobalt concentration is fully commercialized and proprietary prodcut of EGE Kimya A.Ş.