The Effect of Organic Modificaition Method onto Montmorillonite on Mechanical Properties of Natural Rubber

Abstract

Montmorillonite is a type of clays that has been used to reinforce polymer including rubber. Therefore this research is aimed to modify mechanical properties of natural rubber (NR) using montmorillonite (MMT) comparing with the organic modified montmorillonite (CTAB-MMT) and organic molecule grafted MMT. The affect of MMT, CTAB-MMT and HTMS-g-CTABMMT on cure characteristics of NR were studied. It was found from the research that the increase of MMT content could prolong the scorch time whereas CTAB-MMT and HTMS-g-CTABMMT could shorten the scorch time. The cure times of the compounds in all cases were not much different. In term of mechanical properties, modulus, tensile strength and tear strength of NR/HTMS-g-CTABMMT vulcanizate were higher than those of NR/MMT and NR/CTAB-MMT vulcanizates. Meanwhile, elongation at break of the NR/ HTMS-g-CTABMMT vulcanizate decreased more than the latter cases