pps proceeding - Abstract Preview
pps proceeding
Symposium: S02 - Polymer Blends and Alloys
Poster Presentation
 
 

Morphological and Rheological behavior of blends of recycled polypropylene/ground tire rubber devulcanized in different exposure times to microwave

Garcia Pamela Sierra (1)*, Scuracchio Carlos Henrique (1), Cruz Sandra Andrea (1)

(1) Universidade Federal do ABC - Sao Paulo - Santo Andre - Brazil

The goal of this work was to prepare blends of recycled polypropylene (PPr)/ground tire rubber (GTR) which present better morphologies in terms of resulting mechanical properties. For this, the microwave devulcanization method was applied in order to make possible for this rubber to flow under the action of a flow field and break-up in small particles during the mechanical processing. In this work, blends of PPr/GTR devulcanized were prepared using a microwave oven. To understand the morphology development of the devulcanized elastomer in different exposure times to microwave into PPr matrix after mechanical processing, morphological and rheological analysis were carried out. Polymer blends with more devulcanized dispersed phase showed a more refined microstructure into the PPr. These droplets showed to have a circular and uniform shape. Rheological measurements showed that all samples exhibited a pseudoplastic behavior, however the addition of GTR into PPr did not significantly altered the viscosity of the thermoplastic matrix in high shear rates obtained in capillary rheometry. The viscosity ratio (p=dispersed phase/matrix) estimated using the capillary rheometer showed that the viscosity of the dispersed phase is at least four times higher than the viscosity of the matrix. Although the samples have showed high viscosity ratio and the dispersed phase presented high elasticity, the SEM images proved the droplet breaks-up occurred.