Styrene-assisted melt free radical grafting of glycidyl methacrylate onto an ethylene and propylene rubber

✍ Scribed by Guo-Hua Hu; Hervé Cartier

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1999
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 273 KB
• Volume: 71
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0021-8995
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1097-4628(19990103)71:1<125::aid-app15>3.0.co;2-s

✦ Synopsis

This article deals with the efficiency of using styrene (St) as a comonomer to promote the melt free radical grafting of glycidyl methacrylate (GMA) onto an ethylene and propylene rubber (EPR) in a batch mixer and a corotating self-wiping twin screw extruder. The addition of St to an EPR/GMA/peroxide system increases not only GMA's grafting yield but also its grafting rate. The time required for the EPR/GMA/ peroxide system without St to reach a given amount of grafted GMA is at least 10 times that needed for the same system in the presence of an equimolar amount of St. For example, about 60 min are required for the EPR/GMA/dicumyl peroxide (composition: 100/3.0/0.3 by weight) to reach 1.5 phr (parts per hundred resin) GMA (i.e., 1.5 g grafted GMA per 100 g EPR). The same amount of grafted GMA is reached in Ͻ 3 min when 3.0 phr St is charged to the system. This significant reduction of reaction time is crucial for a successful free radical grafting of GMA on EPR in a corotating twin screw extruder, because the residence time in such a machine is typically on the order of 0.5-5 min.