In this work, native emulsion polymerization styrene butadiene rubber (SBR) were first grafted by vinyltriethoxysilane (VTES) to SBR-g-VTES (VTES grafted SBR), second, the SBR-g-VTES were modified by different amount of TEOS (tetraethoxysilane) using in situ sol-gel method, at the last, the extra silica was added into the in situ modified SBR system to get the modified SBR/ silica composites using latex coagulation technology. The effect of different amount of TEOS on modified SBR/silica composites was also systematically studied, including the content of silica and utilization of silica, cure characteristics, physical mechanical properties and dynamic mechanical properties. The surface properties of modified SBR/silica composites were characterized by scanning electron microscope (SEM). It can be got that the grafting of VTES and in situ hydrolysis and condensation of TEOS can effectively inhibit the agglomeration and improve the mechanical properties of modified SBR/silica. It also can be found that modified SBR brings well physical and dynamic mechanical properties, wear resistance, and low rolling resistance to SBR, especially, when the TEOS is 3.0 g, the best overall performance of modified SBR/silica can be achieved. POLYM. COMPOS., 39:22-28, 2018. V C 2016 Society of Plastics Engineers
INTRODUCTIONSynthetic rubbers are now commonly used in pneumatic tires. Tires must have a lot of requirements, especially for sufficient grip on the road, transmit steering forces to guide the vehicle and have as low as possible impact on fuel consumption [1]. According to investigation statistics, in the process of vehicle driving, the rolling resistance of tire is 20-30% of the total energy consumption of automobile. Furthermore, the rolling loss of tread is about 50% of the total energy consumption of tire [2].In the prevailing paper, carbon black (CB) and silica have been used as the main reinforcing fillers to resolve these problems that increase the usefulness of rubbers in tire [3,4].As discussed previously, silica can yield a lower rolling resistance at equal wear resistance and wet grip than CB. However, nano silica has a number of hydroxyl groups (silanol, Si-OH), which results in strong filler-filler interactions and adsorption of polar materials by hydrogen bonds [5]. The effective way is to use a coupling agent to modify the surface of silica, which can increase the filler-rubber interaction and improve silica dispersion in the composites, whereas, this method has two shortcomings, the first is that it is difficult to ensure each silica particle is organically modified by the molecules of silane coupling agent, the second is that the chemical bonding between rubber and silica cannot actually work quite right. As a result, researchers reported that in order to lower the rolling loss and higher wet resistance, introducing the functional groups which can either "passivate" free terminals or react with reinforcing filler into the macromolecular chains becomes a research focus in recent years [2].Up to now, there ...