Kinetics of formation and viscoelastic and mechanical properties of optically transparent interpenetrating networks of poly(methyl methacrylate)/polyurethane

Abstract

An optically transparent material with enhanced physical-mechanical properties was synthesized, which is based on the in situ formed sequential interpenetrating polymer networks of poly(methyl methacrylate)/polyurethane with an oligoester component. The kinetic features of polymerization of methyl methacrylate in these systems were studied. It was established that the polymerization rate of methyl methacrylate increases with an increase in the content of a polyurethane component, which results from an increase in the system viscosity. Irrespective of the content of polyurethane (15, 20 or 25 wt.%), optically transparent materials with a light transmission coefficient of about 90% were formed. The method of dynamic mechanical analysis showed that the modification of cross-linked poly(methyl methacrylate) with cross-linked polyurethane led to a decrease in the value of the elastic modulus; the value of the loss modulus being increased with an increase in polyurethane content. This indicated bot a decrease in fragility and the improvement in impact strength of the glass-like material. According to the study of physical-mechanical properties of the materials, the presence of polyurethane in their composition resulted in an increase in the impact strength and relative breaking elongation and in the reduction of the Young modulus. It was found that the interpenetrating polymer network containing 20% of polyurethane showed the best values of breaking strength, breaking elongation and Charpy impact.