The role of rubber characteristics in preparing rubber/clay nanocomposites by melt compounding

Rubber/organic clay (OC) nanocomposites were produced by melt blending. Polar or unsaturated matrices (e.g., NBR and SBR) could easily enter into OC layers, whereas using nonpolar unsaturated rubber (EPDM), without other additives' help, intercalation structure could not be directly obtained. For the EPDM system, an intercalated structure was observed in presence of stearic acid (SA) for composites composed of SA and OC. Transmission electron microscopy observation showed that the dispersion of clay in nonpolar saturated rubber matrix was much poorer than that in polar or unsaturated matrix. The same effect of polar matrix was confirmed by comparison between IIR/OC and BIIR/OC systems. Moreover, using OC pretreated by SA (S-OC), the dispersion of clay was obviously improved in the investigated nanocomposites, due to the intercalation of SA into OC interlayers. Especially in the nonpolar saturated EPDM system, the intercalation structure could be easily observed. Relative to the corresponding nanocomposites using OC, tensile strengths and the stresses at low strain of NBR and SBR based nanocomposites with S-OC were significantly improved; while with EPDM nanocomposite, using S-OC, only tensile strengths were improved but the stresses at low strain were almost the same, which should be related to the different interfacial force between OC and different rubber matrices. (C) 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.