Lifetime Prediction of Flame Retardant-Filled Ethylene-Propylene-Diene-Termonomer Rubber Compounds

The lifetime of ethylene-propylene-diene-termonomer (EPDM) based rubber compounds with various flame retardants (FRs) including antimony trioxide (Sb2O3), halogenated (Br, Cl) materials and their combinations with Sb2O3 have been explored in this study. The tensile properties of the compounds have been evaluated before and after the thermal ageing over a range of temperatures, 120, 135, 150 and 165 degrees C for different span of time. A 50% reduction in elongation at break (EB) due to thermal ageing is fixed as a failure criterion to predict the lifetime with the help of Dakin-Arrhenius equations. The predicted lifetime of the base EPDM and its Sb2O3-filled compounds shows almost 100 years at ambient temperature. However, the bromine containing flame retardant-filled EPDM as well as its combination with Sb2O3-filled EPDM compounds have reduced their lifetime to almost half of the lifetime of base EPDM. The predicted lifetime of EPDM compounds with chlorine containing FR and its combination with Sb2O3 shows around 90 years and 82 years, respectively.