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pps proceeding
Symposium: S03 - Rheology and Process Simulation
Oral Presentation
 
 

APPLICATION OF MULTI-SCALE APPROACH TO RUBBERS REINFORCED AT DIFFERENT PROCESSING CONDITIONS

Ivaneiko Ievgeniia (1)*, Toshchevikov V. (1), Svistkov A. L. (2), Heinrich G. (1), Saphiannikova M. (1)

(1) Leibniz-Institut für Polymerforschung Dresden e.V. - Saxony - Germany, (2) Institute of Continuous Media Mechanics - Perm - Russia

Investigation of the dynamic-mechanical properties of reinforced elastomers is of high technological importance for the improvement of performance of rubber compounds in tire treads with low rolling resistance and high wet grip. Such investigation can be successfully executed with a help of a recently developed multi-scale approach [1-3]. This approach allows to fit the master curves constructed for the storage and loss moduli of unfilled and filled rubbers at a chosen reference temperature in a wide range of frequencies stretching over 15 decades. The multi-scale approach is based on the distribution function of relaxation times and presumes four distinct power-law regimes. Starting from the high frequencies, these regimes are determined by: 1) rotational and vibrational motions inside the monomer, 2) the semiflexible chain behaviour on a scale of the Kuhn segment, 3) the relaxation of flexible network strands, and 4) the relaxation of network defects such as entangled dangling chains in randomly cross-linked rubbers. The scaling exponents typical for unfilled rubbers are found to decrease with the addition of filler due to localization of network chains on the surface of filler particles. In the present study the reinforced compounds, comprised of solution-polymerized styrene butadiene rubber and carbon black, have been chosen to investigate the influence of processing conditions by applying different mixing times and different curing packages. The latter contained increasing amount of sulfur and thus resulted in increasing cross-link density. Additionally, we investigate the influence of extra hard carbon fillers, such as multi-walled carbon nanotubes, graphene and nanodiamonds, on the performance of rubber compounds.