No abstract

The paper presents the polystyrene reinforcing effect of some styrene-diene block-copolymers on the physical-mechanical characteristics and thermal degradation stability of the associated composites.

The recycled polypropylene (rPP) materials that meet technical requirements such as reducing the dimensions and improving the tensile, elongation, impact strength, thermal stability, as well as melt processing, are required for the manufacturing industry. In this paper, we studied the mechanical and thermal properties of post-consumer rPP by adding both synthesized thermoplastic elastomers, and glass bubbles (GB) by a melt allowing process. Styrene-butadiene (SBS) and styrene-isoprene (SIS) block-copolymers that had a styrene content of 30 wt% were synthesized by anionic sequential polymerization. The obtained post-consumer rPP composites were characterized by optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), mechanical analyses (tensile, density, hardness, VICAT softening temperature (VST), heat deflection temperature (HDT), dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA), IZOD strength) and thermal analyses (differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA)). Weight reduction and improvement of the tensile, elongation, impact strength, thermal stability, as well as melt processing of post-consumer recycled polypropylene (rPP) properties compounded with thermoplastic elastomers and glass bubbles, sustain the use of these formulations for engineering applications.

This paper presents the reinforcement effect of bentonite (0 - 30%) on styrene-diene block-copolymers in correlation with the biphasic morphology of these thermoplastic elastomers.

This paper presents a modification study of recovered polypropylene by melt alloying with a styrene-isoprene block-copolymer blend, thus ensuring the optimum conditions to obtain polypropylene composites with performance impact strength.

No abstract

Recycling of electric and electronic equipment is an emerging global issue in order to decrease the high amount of waste deposited on landfill or incinerated, and thus reducing the environmental pollution. Different strategies of eliminating this waste can be applied. In this paper, the non‐metallic fraction of printed circuit boards, due to the contained amount of glass fiber and rigid epoxy matrix, are considered suitable for valorization as reinforcing filler for polyvinyl chloride recovered from the insulation of equipment cables. The composites containing up to 30% filler are characterized in terms of structural, morphological, thermal, dielectric, mechanical and dynamic‐mechanical properties. Physical interactions are established between the components. Good homogeneity of composites at small dosages of filler is proven, and thus the mechanical and dynamic‐mechanical properties present increased or unchanged values compared with the polymeric matrix. At higher amounts of waste powder, some defects and agglomerates are observed and correlated with decreased values of the main tensile characteristics. Based on the physical‐mechanical and dielectric characterization, the paper shows that reinforced recycled polyvinyl chloride composites with 15%–20% non‐metallic fraction of printed circuit boards waste present suitable properties for reuse the polymer in different technical applications, mainly as insulating technical materials.

No abstract