Rheological properties and foam processibility of precured EPDM

EPDM foam was prepared by dynamically vulcanizing EPDM compound in a HAAKE rheometer firstly, then mixing the partially precured EPDM compound with a blowing agent and a sulfur vulcanizing system on a two roll mill. The compound was extruded through a cold feed extruder, and the extrudate was foamed in a circulating hot air oven. EPDM compound was vulcanized partly in the HAAKE rheometer, the final torque increases with increasing sulfur content. Rheological measurement shows the dynamic storage modulus, the loss modulus, and the complex viscosity of precured EPDM compound increase with increasing sulfur content. Then the partially precured EPDM compound was compounded with a blowing agent and a sulfur vulcanizing systems, Rheometric measurement shows that the rate of vulcanization of partially precured EPDM compound is not affected by the precure. The blowing results show that the foam processibility could be improved and the expansion ratio increases in the same processing condition for optimum partially precured EPDM compound, which indicates the optimum crosslink density for EPDM could enhance the efficiency of blowing agent AC. SEM shows that the foam articles have a closed-cell structure with few open cells, and the large cells inlay among the small cells. (c) 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.