Characterization of eco-friendly processing aids for styrene butadiene rubber composites with silica

Abstract

With the development of environmentally friendly “green tires” in the tire industry, silica has been used as a reinforcing filler material in tread compounds. With regard to this rubber compounding process, non-toxic, and renewable processing aids are required. We fabricated such processing aids with multi-alcohol components of hydrophobic and hydrophilic groups (M-A-S) to make the hydrophilic silica compatible with the hydrophobic rubber matrix. The rubber composites with M-A-S showed remarkable enhancements in the mechanical properties, specifically the tensile strength, elongation and fatigue properties due to the improved dispersion of silica in the rubber matrix. They also exhibited outstanding heat build-up, good rebound resilience, and abrasion levels at low loadings. Furthermore, M-A-S were added directly to tread compounds to make a pneumatic tire with enhanced high-speed durability and enhanced dry and wet braking due to the strong interfacial interaction between the silica and the rubber matrix. These results demonstrate the advantages of the proposed potential replacement for metal-ion processing aids for tire engineering.