Struktol Company of America

Group VII atom containing polymers such as chlorine rubber, and fluorine rubber tend to show a high degree polarity due to their high molar attraction constants [1]. Their practical applications include molded parts, cable, hose, o-rings, etc., which require chemical resistance. In molding the final products, there are several problems such as shrinkage, porosity, blisters, poor knitting, backrinding (retractive spew), tearing on molding and bloom. This is due to improper choice of chemical additives, poor mold design, and poor processing conditions. In order to improve the demolding property of the polymer compounds, the degree of resistance of polymer to additive should be higher. They should not stick on the processing equipment and should easily demold from the equipment at demolding stage i.e. the low degree of cohesion between two materials. The theory that “like dissolves like” says where the square root of the value of the solubility parameter (δ) differences between two materials are less than unity, then they are soluble (miscible) [1]. Fluorinated polymers are good examples of insoluble material for hydrocarbon oil because the polar fluorine is not soluble to non-polar hydrocarbon oil. The solubility of fluorinated plastic/rubber in hydrocarbon oil decreases with increasing fluorine level due to increased dipole moment of fluorine [2]. The typical demolding additives consist of silicon oils, organics, dusting agents, semi-permanent release agents and lubricants [3]. Compounds that are developed for practical use in production can encounter various processing problems. The problems in the processing of rubber are directly related to some of the performance properties that are required for the final products. A substitution of raw materials will not resolve these issues. Perfluorinated sulfonamides are known as very efficient processing additives for specialty polymers (e.g. FKM, ACM or MVQ) that improve the flowabilty, release or demolding. This research compared the additives based on silicone, fluorinated, nonfluorinated and the availability of an alternative non-fluorinated processing additive based on previous research of Struktol [4-8] and Schill+Seilacher [9].