POLYMERS

and
COUMPOUNDING

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 Final Semester
Seminar
Presented by
Jaiby John Mathews
IV Semester
PGTE
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 Guided by

Dr. N. Ramani

Principal

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 Introduction
Fascinating world of plastics I came across
during my project period while during the
analysis. Database of thousands of plastic in
which further can added.

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 What is a polymer ?
Substance in which molecules form long
chains usually several thousands of atoms
together starting from a single molecule.
Single molecule is called Monomer

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 Origin
From Sedimentary geological deposits
thousands years old i.e. petroleum, which is
the origin of most of today’s synthetic

polymers

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 Oil distillation
Crude oil is readily distilled to separate
into fractions. The chemical industry
requires the C1-C5 fraction and there is a

surfeit of heavier molecules.

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The petroleum distillate is therefore cracked
into streams at 700-8000C in a catalytic or
fluid bed of Fuller’s earth cracking into C1,
C2, C3, C4 and C5 and aromatic streams.

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 Basically, all polymers are formed
by the creation of chemical linkages
between monomers. The linkages
are formed by either one or a
combination of two types of
reactions namely addition and
condensation reactions.

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 Nature
The behaviour and structure of the
polymers are based both on the chemical
nature and the way in which the chains fit

together.

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When subjected to stress
•Stretching

•Bending

•Interference of molecules material this

shows a delay between the application of the
stress and the resulting strain. This is called
visco-elastic behavior
When subjected to temperature

polymer materials is to soften them and

eventually to cause them to form a
viscous melt in the case of thermoplastic
materials, or to form a gel like soft
structure in the case of thermoset
materials.
When subjected to electrical field
• the effect will vary with the structure of the
material.
• if there is a mild dipole induced and virtually

no charge carrier migration, then it is a good

electrical insulator with a low dielectric constant
and good to excellent resistance to dielectric
breakdown.
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 When subjected to
electro-magnetic radiation
•the structure which will propagate radiation
is called transparent otherwise opaque.
• many plastics are not only transparent but

they are colourless when they do not

selectively absorb certain wave lengths of
light in the visible spectrum.
 When subjected to U-V rays
• subjected to chemical change
• activation energy causes breakage and
formation of new bonds
•In some cases the action of the light cause
the release of gaseous products such as HCl
in PVC or the change in some of physical
properties of the material such as impact
strength, tensile strength or some electrical
properties.
 General classifications
based on
•Chemical behavior

Thermoplastic & thermoset

A thermoplastic consists of long,
linear molecules each of which may
side-chains or groups (i.e. branched
are present in the molecules but are
not cross linked).
 When heated the individual chain
slips causing plastic flow. Thus
they can be repeatedly melted and
reshaped by heating and cooling so
that any scrap generated can be
reused. No chemical change occurs
during the deformation but it
burned some degree.

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 Thermoplastics
can be again classifieds as
commodity and engineering plastics.
The commodity plastics are used where in no-
load or very low load applications, while the
engineering plastics can be designed to carry
loads for a long period of time.

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 Commodity plastics can be again classified as
polyolefin’s, styrenic, vinyl, others.
Polyolefin family contains polyethylene (PE),
polypropylene (PP), polybutylene (PB) etc. Styrenic
family contains polystyrene (PS), styrene-
acryonitrile (SAN), styrene-butadiene (SB),
acryonitrile- butadiene -styrene- (ABS) etc. vinyl
family consists of polyvinylchloride (PVC),
chlorinated polyvinylchloride (CPVC), other
commodity thermoplastic contains polymethyl-
methacrylate (PMMA), cellulose acetate, cellulose
nitratate etc.
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 Engineering plastics contains
acetals, fluoro-plastics, polyamides
(nylons), polyamide-imide,
polyarylates, polycarbonates,
polyesters, polyketones,
polyphenyleneoxide,
polyphenylenesulfide and sulfone
etc.
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 Thermosets
A thermoset are resin that under go
chemical change called curing during
processing to form cross-linked structure
and become permanently insoluble and
infusible.
 They are alkyds, epoxies, melamines,
phenolics, polyesters, silicones, urea
and urethanes.
Advantages for thermosets are
high thermal stability, resistance to
creep and deformation under load, high
dimensionally stability, high rigidity ,
hardness, light weight ,excellent
electrical insulating properties, low cost
etc.
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 According to structure
Crystalline
Molecules packed closer together and
align themselves in some orderly pattern.
During processing they tend to develop
higher strength in the direction of the
molecules

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 Since commercially perfect crystalline
polymers are not produced they are
identified technically as semi- crystalline
thermoplastics. A crystalline area is stiffer
and stronger. It is difficult to process
crystalline materials due to high melt
temperature, melt viscosity, shrinkage.

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They have relatively sharp melting point i.e.
they do not soften gradually with increasing
temperature, but remain hard until a given
quantity of heat has been absorbed, then
change rapidly into a low viscosity liquid.

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E.g. for crystalline
are
PP, PE, Nylon

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 Amorphous
They are having molecules
going in all different directions
are normally transparent. They
will under go small volumetric
changes when on processing.
They are tougher and more
flexible.
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They will often soften gradually as
they are heated but they do not
flow easily. Therefore it is easy to
process amorphous plastic.
A crystalline plastic is heated to a
particular temperature and sudden
quenching give amorphous
structure.

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 E.g.
for
Amorphous

ABS, PMMA, PC, PS, PVC

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Characteristics of polymers

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 Versatility

The properties of a plastic material can literally

be tailored to meet the requirements of specific
end use applications.

These tailor made properties can be obtained by

either

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 a, altering the basic chemical
composition
b, using different additives that
are melt blended with the
polymer to enhance specific
properties that are lacking in
the base polymer.
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 Relatively Easy to Mould into
Complex Shapes:
The injection molding process
can be used to produce
thermoplastic or thermosetting
plastic parts of very complex
geometry. These parts can be mass
Produced and require little or no
secondary finishing.
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 Low Specific Gravity:
Neat plastic materials have
specific gravities that range from
approximately 0.8 to 1.8. These
values are much lower than those
for steel, which has a specific
gravity of more than seven. Thus
plastic materials also have good
strength / weight or stiffness /
weight ratios.
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 Sometimes Transparent
Materials such as
polycarbonate offer light
transmission that is similar to
glass, along with toughness,
low specific gravity and good
manufacturability.

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 Colouring Throughout
Colouring additives such as
pigments or dyes are commonly
melting blended directly into the
polymer formulation. The use of
colorants obviously eliminates the
cost of secondary operations
associated with painting and
potential cleaner or solvent
hazards.
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Problem such as paint chipping
are also eliminated since the
colour is integral. In addition
damage due to abrasion or
scratching, is much less obvious
when the colour is distributed
out the thickness of the part.
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 Relatively Low Energy
polymers generally have
significantly lower processing
temperatures values (i.e. lower
T m) and lower specific
gravities/part weights (i.e. low m).
The specific heat values for
polymers are generally higher than
for other competitive materials;
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 Chemical Resistance
Most plastic materials offer good
resistant to corrosion caused by the
presence of moisture, salts, weak
acids and bases. However, most
thermoplastics are soluble or will
swell in the presence of specific
organic solvents especially at
elevated temperatures.
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 Good Electrical Insulation:
Many plastic materials offer
outstanding electrical insulating
properties, and as a result find
widespread use in electrical
insulating applications such as
switches and electronic
enclosures.
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 Good Thermal Insulation
Plastic materials also offer good
thermal insulation. This is
important in a variety of energy
conservation applications. The
reduced heat transfer rates give
plastic products a warm feel, even
when the temperature of plastic
object is cool.
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 Flammable
Almost all plastic materials will
burn to some degree or
decompose when subject to
combustion conditions. The
flammability resistance of most
plastic materials can be improved
using flame retardant additive
packages.
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 Relatively High Coefficient of
Thermal Expansion:
In general, plastic materials have
relatively high coefficients of thermal expansion
(CTE). This becomes a concern when plastics
are used as a component of a larger product
assembly containing metals, glass, ceramics or
even another plastic material (having a
different CTE value) due to the thermal
expansion mismatch.
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Compounding of polymers

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Compounding is the name of the process
by which the constituents are intimately
mixed together in the molten state into as
nearly a homogeneous mass as possible.
This is the general term given to
(1) the process of alloying or blending
polymers;
(2) using additives and fillers such as
colorants, flame retardants, antistatic
agents, plasticizers, and others.

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 Alloying and Blending

When the combination of polymers

produces a product that has a single
glass transition temperature and that
exhibits a synergistic effect in
properties, the product is called an
alloy.

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 When the combination
produces a product with
multiple glass transition
temperatures and with
properties that are the average
of the contributions of the
individual constituent polymers,
the product is called a blend.
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 Fillers and Additives
These materials are compounded with
plastics to change and improve their
physical, mechanical, and processing
properties

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Fillers- may be inorganic, organic, mineral,
natural, or synthetic. They are more
commonly used with the thermosetting
resins such as the phenolics, ureas, and
melamines, although they are also used for
some thermoplastics. Large amount of fillers
are called extenders since they allow the
production of a large volume of the plastic
with a small amount of resin, thereby
reducing the cost of the plastic.

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Because the properties of an extended
plastic often decrease, its use is limited
to less critical applications. One of the
most widely used filler is wood flour.
Examples of mineral fillers are calcium
carbonate, silica, and clay

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 Plasticizers- are used generally to
enhance flexibility, resiliency, and
melt flow of the plastics. A
plasticizer is not chemically linked to
the plastic, but acts like an internal
lubricant by reducing the vander-
Waals forces between the polymer
chains, and by separating the chains
to prevent them from intermeshing.
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Heat stabilizers- prevent the
degradation of resins during
processing when melts are
subjected to high
temperatures, or they extend
the life of end products of
which they become a part.

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 Antioxidants- protect materials
from deterioration through oxidation
brought on by heat, light, or chemically
induced mechanisms.
Deterioration is manifested by
embitterment, melt-flow instability, loss
of tensile properties, and discoloration.

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 Ultraviolet (UV) light absorbers -
stabilize the colour and lengthen the
life of the product because virtually
every plastic degrades in sun- light in a
number of ways, the most common
being discoloration and the loss of
physical properties

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 Antistatic agents-
sometimes-called destaticizers
are used to reduce the build
up of electrostatic charges on
the surface of the plastics due
to their inherent poor electrical
conduction.

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 Coupling or sizing agents-
are added to improve the
bonding of plastic to its inorganic
filler materials, such as glass
fibres. Silanes and titanates are
used for this purpose.

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 Flame retardants- are added to
reduce the flammability of plastics
because they insulate the plastic,
create an endothermic cooling
reaction, coat the plastic thereby
excluding oxygen, or actually
influence the combustion through a
reaction with materials that have
different physical properties.
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 Blowing agents- is used
singly or in combination with
other substances to produce
cellular structure (foam) in a
plastic mass.

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Lubricants- is used to enhance the
resins processability and the
appearance of the final products.
Colorants- must provide colorfastness
when exposed to light, temperature,
humidity, chemicals, and so on, but
without reducing other desirable
properties such as flow during
processing, resistance to chalking and
impact strength
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Various mixing processes
There are basically two
processes in mixing they are
1, Extensive or distributive
mixing or blending
2, Intensive or dispersive
mixing or compounding

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Extensive or distributive mixing

It consists essentially of stirring

together the ingredients. Often this
will mean the blending of a number
of solids, e.g. polypropylene
powder, pigment and antioxidant.

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Intensive or dispersive mixing
Dispersive mixing involves the more intimate
dispersion of the additives into the matrix of
the polymer. It usually requires
.a physical change in the components
.high shear forces to bring about the
change
.the polymer to be in the molten or
rubbery state during mixing.

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Various machines for blending
Twin-drum tumbler
Interrupted spiral blade
High speed mixer
Z-blade mixer
Ball mill
Cowles dissolver

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 Effect of fillers on properties
and performance on polymers

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 Structurally the fillers may be
aggregates with essentially round
or polyhedral shapes such as clay
or chalk, plates or flakes such as
mica, or lamellar glass, fibres such
as fibreglass, asbestos, or synthetic
fibres, or cellular material such as
vermiculite, foamed glass, or
hollow glass beads.
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 The second way that the fillers can be
characterized is by their interaction with the
polymer matrix. The fillers can be adherent
to the polymer matrix whether inhertly or
by special surface treatment. The fillers
may absorb the polymer phase because of
high surface area and inherent wettability.
They can react chemically with the polymer
material to form a chemical bond, again,
both by inherent structure or by suitable
surface treatment.
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The fibre filler substantially alters
the thermal properties of the
material. The thermal conductivity
of the composite is increased to a
level close to that of the glass
filler.

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 Glassfibre-:
This improved performance under
dynamic loading by increasing the heat
transfer through the material and
reducing the tendency to local heating
and failure. The thermal expansion of
the material is drastically reduced.

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Flake fillers-:
The use of plate like or flake
reinforcement is common in plastics
composites. Mica, both natural and
synthetic, is one of the most
common plates like reinforcements.
Another is flake glass.

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The effect of this type of reinforcement
depends again on the orientation of
the flakes and on the quality of the
resin reinforcement bond. If the bond
is strong enough in shear so that the
reinforcing material can be stressed to
a large fraction of the tensile or
compressive strength of the composite
it is substantially greater than the
parent resin material.
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 The non-fibrous polyhedral fillers, which
have good adhesion to the resin matrix,
also contribute significant improvements to
the overall physical properties of the
composites of which they are a part. The
effect is not as dramatic as that for the
extended surface fillers such as the fibres
and flakes, but they do represent an
important way of improving the
performance of plastics, usually with a
reduction in cost.
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 The material divides the stress between the
filler and resin phases so that the combined
value of the two appears to be the volume
average of the values for the two phases.
The interactions are a simplified one in which
we have shown parallel columns of resin and
filler and resin alone. In a random dispersion,
this arrangement would not exist where the
stress transfer is by direct compression;
however, the stress transfer by shear plus
compression

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 The clay is used to add bulk and improve
primarily the compression properties while
the fibre glass is used to improve the tensile
and compression properties. The most
economical filler for a resin is a gas such as
nitrogen, or air. Many low-density plastics
are made by incorporating a gas during the
processing as, for example, in thermoplastic
and thermoset foams like urethane and
styrene foam.

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CASE STUDY

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 Conclusion
A through knowledge of polymers helps to
find out right polymer from n number of
polymers which can be make from various
combinations of polymers. Adding of external
material like glass, mica, talc, calcium
carbonate etc. as filler various inherent
limitations of polymers can be improved.
Selection of filler added polymers for various
applications should be carefully done.

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 Bibliography
The principles of material selection for engineering
design- Pat L Mangonon- Prentice Hall- pgs 666-701-1999
Injection moulding hand book – Rosato –Chapman&Hall-
chapter6-1995
Polymer processing- D.H Morton Jones- Chapman&Hall-
chapters1&3-1989
Plastic product design engineering handbook- Levy &
Dubois- Chapman&Hall- chapters1&3-1984
Plastic part design for injection moulding- R.A.Malloy-
Hanser publications- chapter1-1994
Injection moulding of plastics- Walker & Martin- plastic
institute- chapters1&3-1966
Product design with plastics- J.B.Dym-Industrial press
inc.- chapter 5-1983
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