Thermal degradation of polymers. II further thermogravimetric and differential thermal analysis studies of atactic poly(m‐aminostyrene) homopolymers, copolymers, and related polymers

Abstract

SynopsisThermogravimetric and differential thermal analysis have been employed to study the effect on the thermal degradation pattern in static air of the molecular weight of poly(maminostyrene) homopolymers and copolymers with styrene. Related substituted styrene polymers and copolymen with styrene have also been studied in order to assess the effect of introduction of amino, substituted amino, and hydroxy groupings into a polystyrene main chain. The effect of these groupings on the thermal stability of the polymers as compared with polystyrene suggests that the inherent antioxidant characteristics of the subtituent grouping plays the major role in stabilization. A molecular weight effect has been shown to be operative for m-aminostyrene, p-N,N-dimethylaminostyrene, and m-hydroxystyrene polymers. This manifests itself in terms of different thermograms rather than by significantly influencing the procedural decomposition temperatures, although a trend is seen.