Thermal insulating panel composite
View Patent ↗Prepare an article by providing an extruded thermoplastic polymer foam having a cavity defined therein and placing a vacuum insulation panel entirely within the cavity.
1. An article comprising:
a. an extruded thermoplastic polymer foam that has a thermoplastic polymer matrix defining a multitude of cells, the extruded thermoplastic polymer foam defining at least one cavity; and
b. a vacuum insulation panel residing entirely within at least one cavity of the extruded thermoplastic polymer foam wherein the vacuum insulation panel comprises a flexible barrier material enclosing a volume that is under vacuum and occupied by an open-celled polymeric foam core material;
wherein the portion of the foam residing between the cavity containing the vacuum insulation panel and a surface of the extruded thermoplastic polymer foam has a higher density than the extruded thermoplastic polymer foam on average.
2. The article of claim 1 , wherein the article comprises multiple vacuum insulation panels entirely enclosed within extruded polymeric foam.
3. The article of claim 2 , wherein the article comprises a first set of multiple vacuum insulation panels next to one another and residing in a first plane of the article and a second set of multiple vacuum insulation panels positioned so to overlap two or more vacuum insulation panels of the first set and residing in the article in a position other than in first plane.
4. The article of claim 1 , wherein the extruded thermoplastic polymer foam is free of halogenated blowing agents and has a thermal conductivity of 25 milliWatts per meter per Kelvin or less.
5. A process for preparing the Article of claim 1 , the process comprising: (a) providing a first extruded polymeric foam having a cavity defined therein and having a portion of the foam residing between the cavity and a surface of the first extruded thermoplastic polymeric foam has a higher density than the extruded thermoplastic polymer foam on average; and (b) placing a vacuum insulation panel entirely within the cavity.
6. The process of claim 5 , wherein step (a) includes extruding the polymer foam in an absence of halogenated blowing agent.
7. The process of claim 5 , wherein step (a) includes defining a cavity into the extruded polymeric foam by cold forming the cavity.
8. The process of claim 5 , further comprising: (c) placing a second extruded polymeric foam over the vacuum insulation panel so as to enclose the vacuum insulation panel with extruded polymeric foam between the first and second extruded polymeric foams.
9. The process of claim 8 , wherein the second extruded polymeric foam of step (c) has a cavity defined therein that mates with the cavity defined in the first extruded polymeric foam so as to create an enclosed cavity within the two extruded polymeric foams wherein the vacuum insulation panel resides.
10. The process of claim 5 , wherein the extruded polymeric foam in step (a) has multiple cavities defined therein, step (b) includes introducing a vacuum insulation panel into more than one cavity and step (c) includes enclosing each vacuum insulation panel in extruded polymeric foam.
11. The process of claim 10 , wherein the second extruded polymeric foam of step (c) has multiple cavities defined therein that mate with the cavities defined in the first extruded polymeric foam so as to create multiple enclosed cavities within the two extruded polymeric foams wherein the multiple vacuum insulation panels reside.