The Thermal Vulcanization of Synthetic Rubber

Abstract

Abstract It is shown that synthetic rubbers, in contrast to natural rubber, can be vulcanized to soft rubber by a simple thermal treatment without any previous admixture of sulfur or accelerators. This process has been designated as “Thermovulcanization” to distinguish it from the regular vulcanization procedure under heat with the addition of sulfur and accelerators. Various synthetic rubbers of Schkopau production have been investigated for their behavior in the process of thermovulcanization. Both butadiene-styrene and butadiene-acrylonitrile copolymers as well as the butadiene block polymerizate lend themselves to vulcanization by this thermal treatment. For the butadiene-styrene copolymer with higher styrene content, thermovulcanization leads to products which are not equivalent to the regular sulfur-accelerator vulcanizates. Natural rubber cannot be vulcanized to soft rubber by thermovulcanization. The investigation of the effect of temperature revealed that a temperature of 195° C, for example, was applicable for all the synthetic rubbers studied. The addition of active carbon was found to accelerate the thermovulcanization process and certain properties of the vulcanizates are improved. The results of some comparative studies are presented, and it is pointed out that thermovulcanizates and normal vulcanizates show agreement in some of their properties and vary in others. The thermovulcanizates, as compared with normal vulcanizates, show somewhat lower tensile strength and somewhat lower fatigue resistance. Also their resistance to swelling is lower. On the other hand they are better in abrasion, have somewhat improved elastic properties, and show improved resistance to aging including surface aging phenomena under static and dynamic stress.