Rubber industry is one of major raw material for many industries around the world. Therefore, supplying quality raw material is major concern among the market player. The objectives of this paper is to formulate natural rubber latex (NRL) by addition of bio fillers and to determine the impact of bio fillers (rice husk ash and tacca starch) towards the tear strength and tensile strength of the film samples. Normally, filler compounded in NRL named carbon black filler is chemical based, expensive and difficult to handle. Blending method was applied whereby named as compounding process. The vulcanized NRL was blended with the bio fillers before manual dipping process applied to obtain the film. The bio filler loaded was 10 phr and 30 phr. The optimum concentration was found to be 10 phr of tacca starch, producing tensile stress at maximum load was 18 Mpa while elongation at break was 650%. In addition, tensile stress at 300 mm elongation was 2 Mpa and tear strength is 15 N/mm.
Specialty natural rubber (SpNR) latex, namely, deproteinized natural rubber (DPNR) latex and epoxidized natural rubber (ENR) latex, has been produced to meet specific product's requirements. However, SpNR is normally used in the form of block rubber to manufacture dry rubber products such as tires and automotive parts. The applications of SpNR latex into latex foam products will be diversified. Findings indicate that foamability of SpNR latex is lower compared to normal latex (LATZ) but shows longer stability time after foamed. Findings also indicate that foam collapse and foam coagulate are two main challenges in the fabrication process of SpNR latex foam. Despite these challenges, SpNR latex foam can be fabricated at different density levels. During the foaming process, additional foaming agent is required to fabricate a SpNR latex foam, which is different from fabricating a normal NR latex foam, especially at low latex foam density. Consequently, a higher level of sodium silicofluoride, used as the gelling agent, is required to set the cell structure of the foam. Findings also indicate that foam density influenced the gelling time and volume shrinkage of the SpNR latex foam. An ideal compounding, foaming, and gelling formulation to fabricate SpNR latex foam via Dunlop batch foaming process has been developed. Morphological study showed that all latex foams are open-cell structure, with lower density foam exhibiting higher porosity and mean pore size. Comparison on hysteresis behavior between DPNR and ENR latex foam indicated that ENR latex foam exhibits higher hysteresis loss ratio compared to DPNR latex foam.
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