elastomer

—elastomeric /i las'teuh mer"ik/, adj.

/i las"teuh meuhr/, n. Chem.

an elastic substance occurring naturally, as natural rubber, or produced synthetically, as butyl rubber or neoprene.

[1935-40; ELAST(IC) + -O- + Gk méros a part]

* * *

▪ chemical compound

Introduction

      any rubbery material composed of long, chainlike molecules that are capable of recovering their original shape after being stretched to great extents. Under normal conditions the long molecules making up an elastomeric material are irregularly coiled. With the application of force, however, the molecules straighten out in the direction in which they are being pulled. Upon release, the molecules spontaneously return to their normal compact, random arrangement.

      The elastomer (from “elastic polymer”) with the longest history of use is natural rubber, which is made from the milky latex of various trees, most usually the Hevea rubber tree. Natural rubber is still an important industrial polymer, but it now competes with a number of synthetic elastomers, such as styrene-butadiene rubber and polybutadiene, which are derived from by-products of petroleum and natural gas. More than half of all rubber produced goes into automobile tires; the rest goes into mechanical parts such as mountings, gaskets, belts, and hoses, as well as consumer products such as shoes, clothing, furniture, and toys.

      This article reviews the composition, structure, and properties of both natural and synthetic elastomers and then describes their production and processing into useful rubber products. For a fuller understanding of the materials from which elastomers are made, see the article industrial polymers, chemistry of.

The composition, structure, and properties of elastomers

Polymers and elasticity

      As explained in the article industrial polymers, chemistry of, a polymeric molecule consists of several thousand chemical repeating units, or monomers, linked together by covalent bonds. The assemblage of linked units is often referred to as the “chain,” and the atoms between which the chemical bonding takes place are said to make up the “backbone” of the chain. In most cases polymers are made up of carbon backbones—that is, chains of carbon (C) atoms linked together by single (C−C) or double (C=C) bonds. In theory, carbon chains are highly flexible, because rotation around carbon-carbon single bonds allows the molecules to take up many different configurations. In practice, however, many polymers are rather stiff and inflexible. The molecules of polystyrene (PS) and polymethyl methacrylate (Lucite) (PMMA), for instance, are made up of relatively bulky units so that, at room temperature, free motion is hindered by severe crowding. In fact, the molecules of PS and PMMA do not move at all at room temperature: they are said to be in a glassy state, in which the random, “amorphous” arrangement of their molecules is frozen in place. All polymers are glassy below a characteristic glass transition temperature (T_g), which ranges from as low as −125° C (−195° F) for an extremely flexible molecule such as polydimethyl siloxane (silicone rubber) to extremely high temperatures for stiff, bulky molecules. For both PS and PMMA, T_g is approximately 100° C (212° F).

      Some other polymers have molecules that fit together so well that they tend to pack together in an ordered crystalline arrangement. In high-density polyethylene, for example, the long sequences of ethylene units that make up the polymer spontaneously crystallize at temperatures below about 130° C (265° F), so that, at normal temperatures, polyethylene is a partially crystalline plastic solid. Polypropylene is another “semicrystalline” material: its crystallites, or crystallized regions, do not melt until they are heated to about 175° C (350° F).

      Thus, not all polymers have the necessary internal flexibility to be extensible and highly elastic. In order to have these properties, polymers must have little internal hindrance to the random motion of their monomer subunits (in other words, they must not be glassy), and they must not spontaneously crystallize (at least at normal temperatures). On release from being extended, they must be able to return spontaneously to a disordered state by random motions of their repeating units as a result of rotations around the carbon-carbon bond. Polymers that can do so are called elastomers. All others are termed plastics or resins; the properties and applications of these materials are described at length separately in the article plastic (thermoplastic and thermosetting resins) (plastic).

  Properties and applications of commercially important elastomers, TableFour common elastomers are cis-polyisoprene (natural rubber, NR), cis-polybutadiene (butadiene rubber, BR), styrene-butadiene rubber (SBR), and ethylene-propylene monomer (EPM). SBR is a mixed polymer, or copolymer, consisting of two different monomer units, styrene and butadiene, arranged randomly along the molecular chain. (The structure of SBR is illustrated in Figure 3B—> of industrial polymers, chemistry of.) EPM also consists of a random arrangement of two monomers—in this case, ethylene and propylene. In SBR and EPM, close packing and crystallinity of the monomer units are prevented by their irregular arrangement along each molecule. In the regular polymers NR and BR, crystallinity is prevented by rather low crystal melting temperatures of about 25° and 5° C (approximately 75° and 40° F), respectively. In addition, the glass transition temperatures of all these polymers are quite low, well below room temperature, so that all of them are soft, highly flexible, and elastic. The principal commercial elastomers are listed in Table 1 (Properties and applications of commercially important elastomers, Table), which also indicates some of their important properties and applications. For more detailed information on the composition, properties, and applications of these materials, links are provided from the table directly to descriptive entries on the polymers listed.

Chemical interlinking: from elastomers to rubbery solids

vulcanization

      The molecular behaviour outlined above is sufficient to give polymers the properties of extensibility and elasticity, but in many cases the properties of elastomers must be modified in order to turn them into useful rubbery materials. The necessity for such modification was first demonstrated by natural rubber (polymer designation cis-polyisoprene) when it began to be produced commercially in the 18th century. Rubber was soon found to have two serious disadvantages: it becomes soft and sticky when warm, because it is really a viscous liquid, and it becomes hard when cold, because it crystallizes slowly below about 5° C (40° F). These disadvantages were overcome in 1839 by the discovery of vulcanization by the American inventor Charles Goodyear (Goodyear, Charles). Goodyear found that a mixture of rubber with some white lead and about 8 percent by weight of sulfur was transformed, on heating, to an elastic solid that remained elastic and resilient at high temperatures and yet stayed soft at low temperatures. It is now known that sulfur reacts with unsaturated hydrocarbon elastomers. One of the consequences is that a few sulfur interlinks (−S_n−) are formed between the polymer molecules, making a loose molecular network, as shown in Figure 1—>. The original elastomeric liquid is thus converted into a solid that will not flow even when warm because the molecules are now permanently tied together. Moreover, addition of a small amount of sulfur in various forms makes the rubber molecules sufficiently irregular that crystallization (and, hence, hardening at low temperatures) is greatly impeded. The linking process is often called curing or, more commonly, vulcanization (after Vulcan, the Roman god of fire). More accurately, the phenomenon is referred to as cross-linking or interlinking, because this is the essential chemical reaction.

      All long, flexible polymer molecules naturally become entangled, like spaghetti. Although all such molecules will disentangle and flow under stress, their physical entanglements will act as temporary “interlinks,” especially when the molecules are long and slow-moving. It is therefore difficult at first sight to distinguish a covalently interlinked elastomer from one that is merely tangled or (as is described below) one that is held together by strong intermolecular associations. One means of distinguishing is to test whether the polymer dissolves in a compatible solvent or merely swells without dissolving. Covalently interlinked molecules do not dissolve. Interlinking is therefore necessary for good solvent resistance or for use at high temperatures.

Free-radical interlinking

      Interlinking can be carried out with reagents other than sulfur—for example, by free-radical reactions that do not require the presence of C=C bonds. Free radicals are formed by irradiation with ultraviolet light, by electron-beam or nuclear radiation, or by the decomposition of unstable additives. In each case a hydrogen atom is torn away from the elastomer molecule, leaving a highly reactive carbon atom (the radical) that will couple with another carbon radical to create a stable C−C bond, interlinking different molecules. Even polyethylene and other fully saturated polymers can be interlinked by a free-radical process. However, for the curing of rubbery materials, sulfur is usually still the reagent of choice. Using accelerators and activators, the vulcanization reaction can be modified in various desirable ways, and sulfur interlinking also yields products of higher strength.

Molecular branching

      Some rubbery solids are made by simultaneous polymerization and interlinking. If during polymerization each unit can add more than one other unit, then as the molecule increases in size it will branch out with many arms that will divide and interlink to create a densely cross-linked solid. The length of molecule between interlinks is small in this case, sometimes only a few carbon atoms long. Such materials are hard and inflexible; epoxy resins are an example. However, if molecular branching is made less frequent, then soft, rubbery materials will be produced. Rubbery products can be made in this way by casting—that is, by using low-viscosity liquid precursors with reactive end-groups. Examples are castable polyurethanes and silicones.

Intermolecular association: thermoplastic elastomers

Hydrogen bonding

      Other rubbery materials consist of elastomers having strong intermolecular associations but no real chemical interlinks. Examples are molecules containing a few hydrogen-bonding groups. If the associations between the molecules are strong enough to prevent flow under moderate stresses, such materials can serve as practical rubbery solids. Also, because the weak interlinks give way at high temperatures, allowing the material to take on a new shape in response to pressure, they can be reprocessed and reused. For this reason these rubbery materials are called thermoplastic elastomers.

Block copolymers

      Another type of intermolecular association is shown by thermoplastic block copolymers, where each molecule consists of long sequences, or blocks, of one unit followed by long sequences of another. Because different polymers are generally incompatible (i.e., do not dissolve into one another), blocks of the same type tend to aggregate and separate into small “domains.” This type of material can be exemplified by styrene-butadiene-styrene (SBS), a “tri-block” copolymer composed of butadiene repeating units in the centre portion of the chain and styrene units at the ends. polystyrene and polybutadiene are incompatible, so that the polystyrene end-groups associate together to form domains of glassy polystyrene in a sea of elastic polybutadiene. The polybutadiene centre portions thus form a connected elastomeric network held together by rigid domains of polystyrene end-blocks, which are relatively stable up to the glass transition temperature of polystyrene (about 100° C, or 212° F). Thus, the material is a rubbery solid at normal temperatures, even though there are no chemical bonds interlinking the molecules. Above the T_g of polystyrene the aggregates can be sheared apart, and the material can be reprocessed and remolded.

Polymer blends

      Yet another kind of thermoplastic elastomer is made by blending a specific elastomer with a specific plastic material. Santoprene (trademark) is an example. Santoprene consists of a mixture of approximately 60 parts ethylene-propylene-diene monomer copolymer (EPDM) with 40 parts polypropylene. A hydrocarbon oil, compatible with EPDM, and interlinking reagents for EPDM are also added. Because the polymers are molecularly incompatible, they form a fine, heterogeneous blend, the individual materials remaining as small, separate regions. During mixing, the EPDM portion becomes chemically interlinked to create a rubbery solid that can be molded (and remolded) at high temperatures, when the polypropylene component becomes soft and fluid. There is some uncertainty about the exact mechanism of elasticity in this material, because the polypropylene component appears to form continuous strands and should therefore make the mixture hard, not rubbery. Polymer blends are finding increasing use as elastomers because processing is simple and because they can be recycled.

Production of elastomers

      The first common elastomer was natural rubber. Formed in a living organism, it consists of solids suspended in a milky fluid, called latex, that circulates in the inner portions of the bark of many tropical and subtropical trees and shrubs. Today, natural rubber constitutes less than half of the rubber on the market; the rest is rubber that is produced synthetically by means of chemical processes that were partly known in the 19th century but were not applied commercially until the second half of the 20th century, after World War II.

      Both natural and synthetic rubber are produced as latex or as a rough, dried material that is packed into bales for shipping to the products fabricator. In order to be made into useful products, these raw polymers must be greatly modified by a number of additives. The production of both natural and synthetic rubber, their modification with additives, and their processing into usable products are covered in this section. The growth of the natural rubber industry and the rise to dominance of synthetics are also traced in this section.

       Properties and applications of commercially important elastomers, TableEssential properties of the principal commercial elastomers are listed in Table 1 (Properties and applications of commercially important elastomers, Table). For more detailed information on the composition, properties, and applications of these materials, links are provided from the table directly to descriptive entries on the polymers listed.

Natural rubber production

The rubber tree

      Commercially, natural rubber is obtained almost exclusively from Hevea brasiliensis, a tree indigenous to South America, where it grows wild to a height of 34 metres (120 feet). Cultivated in plantations, however, the tree grows only to about 24 metres (80 feet) because carbon, necessary for growth, is also an essential constituent of rubber. Since only atmospheric carbon dioxide can supply carbon to the plant, the element has to be rationed between the two needs when the tree is in active production. Also, with foliage limited to the top of the tree (to facilitate tapping), the intake of carbon dioxide is less than in a wild tree. Other trees, shrubs, and herbaceous plants produce rubber, but, because none of them compares for efficiency with Hevea brasiliensis, industry botanists have concentrated their efforts exclusively on this species.

      In the cultivation of Hevea, the natural contours of the land are followed, and the trees are protected from wind. Cover crops planted adjacent to the rubber trees hold rainwater on sloping ground and help to fertilize the soil by fixing atmospheric nitrogen. Standard horticultural techniques, such as nursery growing of hardy rootstocks and grafting on top of them, hand pollination, and vegetative propagation (cloning) to produce a genetically uniform product, are also employed.

      Hevea grows only within a well-defined area of the tropics and subtropics where frost is never encountered. Heavy annual rainfall of about 2,500 millimetres (100 inches) is essential, with emphasis on a wet spring. As a consequence of these requirements, growing areas are limited. Southeast Asia is particularly well situated for rubber culture; so too are parts of South Asia and West Africa. Cultivation of Hevea in Brazil, its native habitat, was virtually destroyed by blight early in the 20th century.

Tapping and coagulation

      When the bark of the Hevea tree is partially cut through (tapped), a milky liquid exudes from the wound and dries to yield a rubbery film. The biological function of this latex is still obscure: it may help wound-healing by protecting the inner bark, or it may serve other biochemical functions. The latex consists of an aqueous suspension of small particles, about 0.5 micrometre in diameter, of cis-polyisoprene, a linear rubbery polymer of high molecular weight. The rubber content of the suspension is about 30 percent.

      Rubber trees are tapped about once every two days, yielding a cupful of latex, containing approximately 50 grams (1.7 ounces) of solid rubber, each time. The standard method of tapping is to score the tree with a knife for half the circumference of the trunk, slanting the cut down from left to right at an angle of 30° starting at the highest point convenient to the tapper. Each subsequent cut is made immediately below its predecessor. Trees are often rested for a period after heavy tapping. Production commences when a tree is 5 or 6 years old; with care, the tree's useful life may extend to more than 20 years. With trees cultivated at a density of 375 per hectare (150 per acre), approximately 2,500 kilograms of rubber can be produced per hectare per year (that is, approximately one ton per acre per year).

      After collection of the tapped latex, rubber is recovered from emulsion by coagulation with formic acid, creating crumbs that resemble curds of milk. The crumbs are washed, dried between rolls, and compacted into blocks 67 by 33 by 18 centimetres (26 by 13 by 7.5 inches) in size and weighing 33.3 kilograms (73 pounds). The blocks are then wrapped in polyethylene sheets and packed into one-ton crates for shipping. Other production is as smoked sheet, where the coagulum is pressed into thin sheets that are washed and then dried over a smoky wood fire. The smoke contains natural fungicides that protect against mold growth and impart a characteristic amber colour. Dried sheets are packed into 110-kilogram (250-pound) bales for shipping.

      About 10 percent of all natural rubber is shipped as latex, concentrated to a rubber content of approximately 60 percent and used for making dipped goods such as surgical gloves, prophylactics, and toys.

Development of the natural rubber industry

      If latex is allowed to evaporate naturally, the film of rubber that forms can be dried and pressed into usable articles such as bottles, shoes, and balls. South American Indians (South American Indian) made such objects in early times: rubber balls, for instance, were used in an Aztec ceremonial game (called ollama) long before Christopher Columbus explored South America and the Caribbean. On his second voyage to the New World in 1493–96, Columbus is said to have seen natives in present-day Haiti play a game with balls made from the gum of a tree. In 1615 a Spaniard related how the Indians, having gathered the milk from incisions made in various trees, brushed it onto their cloaks and also obtained crude footwear and bottles by coating earthen molds and allowing them to dry.

      The first serious accounts of rubber production and the primitive Native American system of manufacture were given in the 18th century by Charles-Marie de La Condamine (La Condamine, Charles-Marie de), a member of a French geographic expedition sent to South America in 1735. La Condamine described “caoutchouc” (the French spelling of a native term for “weeping wood”) as the condensed juice of the Hevea tree, and in 1736 he sent rubber samples to Europe. Initially the new material was merely a scientific curiosity. Some years later the British scientist Joseph Priestley remarked on its usefulness for rubbing pencil marks from paper, and so the popular term rubber was coined. Other applications gradually developed, notably for waterproofing shoes and clothing.

      Important progress toward a true rubber industry came at the beginning of the 19th century from the separate experiments of a Scottish chemist, Charles Macintosh (Macintosh, Charles), and an English inventor, Thomas Hancock (Hancock, Thomas). Macintosh's contribution was the rediscovery, in 1823, of coal-tar naphtha as a cheap and effective solvent. He placed a solution of rubber and naphtha between two fabrics and in so doing avoided the sticky surfaces that had been common in earlier single-texture garments treated with rubber. Manufacture of these double-textured, waterproof cloaks, henceforth known as “mackintoshes (mackintosh),” began soon afterward.

      The work of Hancock, who became Macintosh's colleague and partner, is of even greater importance. He first attempted to dissolve the rubber in turpentine, but his hand-coated fabrics were unsatisfactory in surface texture and smell. He then turned to the production of elastic thread. Strips of rubber were cut from the imported lumps and applied in their crude state to clothing and footwear. In 1820, in an effort to find a use for his waste cuttings, Hancock invented a masticator. Constructed of a hollow wooden cylinder equipped with teeth in which a hand-driven, spiked roller was turned, this tiny machine, originally taking a charge of two ounces of rubber, exceeded Hancock's greatest hopes. Instead of tearing the rubber to shreds, it produced enough friction to weld the scraps of rubber into a coherent mass that could be applied in further manufacture.

      Macintosh's and Hancock's efforts resolved the initial problem of handling the raw material, but there remained one principal obstacle to the full exploitation of natural rubber: it softened with heat and hardened with cold (particularly annoying in North America, where the climate was more extreme than in Britain). It also was tacky, odorous, and perishable. These fundamental weaknesses were removed by the invention of vulcanization in 1839 by Goodyear (Goodyear, Charles). Developing a compound of rubber, white lead, and sulfur and a heat treatment (or curing) process, Goodyear created a product—at first called fireproof gum, afterward vulcanized rubber—that exhibited impressive durability.

      Vulcanization made the modern rubber industry possible by permitting use of the substance in machinery and in tires for bicycles and, later, for automobiles. Though subsequent discoveries have refined Goodyear's original techniques, the vulcanization process remains fundamentally the same as it was in his day.

      With the advent of the bicycle and, somewhat later, the automobile and the invention of the solid and later the pneumatic rubber tire, demand for rubber grew rapidly. By 1900 more than 40,000 tons were used each year, about one-half from Brazil and one-half from central Africa, where rubber was obtained principally from Landolphia vines. However, as an important industrial material, rubber was required in larger amounts than could easily be obtained from wild and widely dispersed trees in the Brazilian jungle or from African vines that produced only about one kilogram per hectare and were destroyed to obtain the rubber. With a view to cultivating rubber trees elsewhere, in 1876 seeds of the Hevea brasiliensis tree from the upper Orinoco basin were brought from Brazil to England at the instigation of the British India Office. Seedlings were raised at Kew Gardens and shipped to Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and Singapore. These trees were the origin of the rubber plantation industry in Asia, which now produces more than 90 percent of the world's supply. The industry developed largely as a result of the work of Henry N. Ridley (Ridley, Henry Nicholas), director of the Singapore Botanic Gardens from 1888 until 1912. Ridley introduced horticultural and tapping methods that are still used today. Total natural rubber production is now approximately 6.5 million tons per year, of which some 70 percent is used in automobile and truck tires. The principal rubber-producing countries are Thailand, Indonesia, and Malaysia, each producing more than one million tons per year. Smaller amounts are produced in China, India, the Philippines, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, and the West African states of Nigeria, Côte d'Ivoire, Cameroon, and Liberia. (For an account of the shift of the world's natural supply from West to East, and of the establishment of Hevea as the preeminent source, see and the rise of Asian plantation rubber.)

      The first decade of the 20th century saw the establishment of the motorcar in Europe and North America, and the automotive industry remained entirely dependent on natural rubber for its tires and other components until World War II. After Japan entered the war in 1941, Asian sources, except for Sri Lanka, were cut off from the Allies. In response, the United States and the Soviet Union attempted to cultivate alternative sources of natural rubber, such as the guayule shrub and the Russian dandelion. (For details on these efforts, see BTW: Alternative sources of natural rubber during World War II.) These attempts met with little success, but far better results were obtained from synthetic rubber. The United States in particular developed a synthetic rubber industry almost overnight, achieving a production of 800,000 tons per year. At the war's end, with natural rubber again available, the U.S. synthetic rubber industry went into a sharp decline, but by the early 1950s superior and more uniform synthetics became available. The export of these materials stimulated development of a synthetic rubber industry in Europe. In the early 1960s production of natural rubber was surpassed by that of synthetic elastomers, which now represent some 60 percent of the total.

Synthetic rubber production

polymerization methods

      Synthetic elastomers are produced on an industrial scale in either solution or emulsion polymerization methods. (Solution polymerization and emulsion polymerization are described in the article industrial polymers, chemistry of.) Polymers made in solution generally have more linear molecules (that is, less branching of side chains from the main polymer chain), and they also have a narrower distribution of molecular weight (that is, greater length) and flow more easily. In addition, the placement of the monomer units in the polymer molecule can be controlled more precisely when polymerization is conducted in solution. The monomer or monomers are dissolved in a hydrocarbon solvent, usually hexane or cyclohexane, and polymerized using an organometallic catalyst such as butyl lithium.

      In emulsion polymerization, the monomer (or monomers) is emulsified in water with a suitable soap (e.g., sodium stearate) employed as a surfactant, and a water-soluble free-radical catalyst (e.g., potassium persulfate, peroxides, a redox system) is added to induce polymerization. (For a schematic diagram of this process, see Figure 1 of the article surface coating.) After polymerization has reached the desired level, the reaction is stopped by adding a radical inhibitor. About 10 percent of synthetic elastomer produced through emulsion techniques is sold as latex. The rest is coagulated with acidified brine, washed, dried, and pressed into 35-kilogram (77-pound) bales.

      When emulsion polymerization of SBR is carried out “hot” (i.e., at 50° C, or 120° F), the polymer molecules are more branched. When polymerization is carried out “cold” (i.e., at 5° C, or 40° F), they are more linear and generally higher in molecular weight—features that improve the rolling resistance and wear resistance of tires. In some cases, polymerization is continued in order to give products of such high molecular weight that they would normally be intractable. In these cases about 30 percent of a heavy oil is added before coagulation to yield “oil-extended” elastomers with superior wear resistance.

The rise of synthetic elastomers

      The origins of synthetic elastomers can be traced to the first half of the 19th century, when attempts were made to elucidate the composition and structure of natural rubber with the eventual goal of reproducing the material. In 1838 the German F.C. Himly obtained a volatile distillate from the substance, and in 1860 the Englishman C. Greville Williams broke down rubber by distillation into three parts—oil, tar, and “spirit”—this last part being the more volatile fraction and the main constituent, which Williams named isoprene. The Frenchman Georges Bouchardat, with the aid of hydrogen chloride gas and prolonged distillation, converted isoprene to a rubberlike substance in 1875, and in 1882 another Briton, W.A. Tilden, produced isoprene by the destructive distillation of turpentine. Tilden also assigned isoprene the structural formula CH₂=C(CH₃)−CH=CH₂.

      The efforts outlined above were attempts to replicate natural rubber. It was only when the search for chemical equivalents to natural rubber was abandoned, and comparable physical properties were emphasized, that synthetic rubber came into being. The choice fell upon butadiene (CH₂=CH−CH=CH₂), a compound similar to isoprene, as the basis for a synthetic product. Several significant contributions came from Russia. In 1901 Ivan Kondakov discovered that dimethyl butadiene, when heated with potash, produced a rubberlike substance, and in 1910 S.V. Lebedev (Lebedev, Sergey Vasilyevich) polymerized butadiene, which he obtained from ethyl alcohol. During World War I, Germany, under the stimulus of the blockade imposed by the Allies, began production of “methyl rubber” using Kondakov's process. This was an inferior substitute by present-day standards, and after the war German manufacturers returned to the cheaper and more satisfactory natural product. Research and experiments continued, however, and in 1926 the German G. Ebert succeeded in producing a sodium-polymerized rubber from butadiene. During the following decade this material evolved into various types of “buna” rubber (so called from the initial syllables of the two materials used to make them: butadiene and natrium [sodium]).

      In the Soviet Union (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics), production of polybutadiene using Lebedev's process was begun in 1932–33, using potatoes and limestone as raw materials. By 1940 the Soviet Union had the largest synthetic rubber industry in the world, producing more than 50,000 tons per year. In Germany, meanwhile, the first synthetic elastomer that could be used to replace natural rubber and make satisfactory tires was developed at I.G. Farben by Walter Bock and Eduard Tschunkur, who synthesized a rubbery copolymer of styrene and butadiene in 1929 using an emulsion process. The Germans referred to this rubber as Buna S; the British called it SBR, or styrene-butadiene rubber. Because styrene and butadiene can be made from petroleum, grain alcohol, or coal, SBR was in great demand during World War II. Immense amounts were made—as much as 100,000 tons per year in Germany and the Soviet Union. About 800,000 tons of SBR were produced per year in the United States, where it received the wartime designation GR-S (government rubber-styrene). During the war German chemical engineers perfected low-temperature, or “cold,” polymerization of SBR, producing a more uniform product.

      Other important synthetic elastomers were discovered in the decades before World War II, though none was suitable for making tires. Among these were polysulfides, synthesized in the United States by Joseph Patrick in 1926 and commercialized after 1930 as oil-resistant Thiokol rubbers; polychloroprene (neoprene), discovered by Arnold Collins in 1931 and commercialized by the DuPont Company in 1932 as Duprene (later neoprene), a high-strength oil-resistant rubber; nitrile rubber (NBR), an oil-resistant copolymer of acrylonitrile and butadiene synthesized by Erich Konrad and Tschunkur in 1930 and known as Buna N in Germany; and butyl rubber (IIR), a copolymer of isoprene and isobutylene discovered in 1937 by the Americans R.M. Thomas and W.J. Sparks at Standard Oil Company (New Jersey).

      After World War II, increasing sophistication in synthetic chemistry led to many new polymers and elastomers. In 1953–54 two chemists, Karl Ziegler of Germany and Giulio Natta of Italy, developed a family of organometallic catalysts (Ziegler-Natta catalyst) that were able to control precisely the placing and arrangement of units along the polymer chain and thus produce regular (stereospecific) structures. With the use of such catalysts, isoprene was polymerized in such a manner that each unit in the chain was linked to its predecessor in a cis configuration, virtually identical to the structure of natural rubber. In this way virtually 100 percent cis-polyisoprene, “synthetic natural rubber,” was made. In 1961 the same type of catalyst with butadiene as the monomer was used to produce cis-1,4-polybutadiene, a rubber that was found to have excellent abrasion resistance, especially in tires subjected to severe service conditions.

      Several other advances characterized the postwar years. For example, block copolymers, in which a long sequence of one chemical unit is followed in the same molecule by a long sequence of another, were made using many different units and sequence lengths. New oil-resistant and heat-resistant elastomers were introduced, including the styrene-acrylonitrile copolymers, the polysulfides, and chlorinated and chlorosulfonated polyethylene. Control has been achieved, to some degree, over the wide range of molecular length found in most polymers, so that narrow or broad distributions can be produced in many cases, with quite different viscous properties. In addition, polymers have been synthesized with branched molecules, either with many small branches along the main chain or with several long “arms” radiating from a central point, giving different flow properties and more facile cross-linking.

      World consumption of synthetic rubber reached 9 million tons in 1993. About 55 percent of all synthetic rubber produced is used in automobile tires.

Additives

      A number of ingredients are added to both natural and synthetic rubber in order to obtain certain desirable properties. By convention, mix formulations begin with the amount of the designated elastomer—for instance, natural rubber (NR), butadiene rubber (BR), or styrene-butadiene rubber (SBR)—given as 100 parts by weight. The amount of each other ingredient is then expressed in parts by weight added per 100 parts by weight of the elastomer. If two or more elastomers are used, then they are shown in the recipe as fractions of 100 parts—for example, “NR, 60 parts; BR, 40 parts.” When the elastomer contains oil already added by the producer, allowance is made for this dilution in the recipe. For example, if SBR 1702 is used, the mix formulation may begin “SBR 1702, 137.5 parts by weight,” because that amount of SBR 1702 contains 37.5 parts by weight of oil and 100 parts by weight of SBR elastomer.

The cure package

      The most important ingredients are those, known as the cure package, that cause interlinking reactions to take place when the mix is “cured.” In order to minimize the risk of premature cure, they are usually added at the end of mixing. The cure package usually consists of sulfur and one or more “accelerators” (e.g., sulfenamides, thiurams, or thiazoles), which make the sulfur interlinking reaction occur faster and more efficiently. When the ratio of sulfur to accelerator is less than one, the recipe is known as an “efficient vulcanization” (EV) system and gives products with sulfur interlinks of shorter length. EV products have improved resilience but lower strength.

      Two other ingredients that play an important role in vulcanization chemistry are known as “activators,” commonly zinc oxide and stearic acid. These compounds react together and with accelerators to form a zinc sulfurating compound, which in turn is the key intermediary in adding sulfur to a diene elastomer and creating sulfur interlinks.

      Other less widely used interlinking reagents are sulfur compounds known as sulfur donors—e.g., tetramethylthiuram disulfide—which introduce monosulfide interlinks between polymer molecules, and peroxides (peroxide), notably dicumyl peroxide. Peroxides decompose on heating to form radicals, which abstract hydrogen from groups on the polymer molecules. Carbon radicals formed in this way on different molecules then combine to create carbon-carbon interlinks. Although products with C−C interlinks are more resistant to heat and oxidative attack, their strength is lower than products with sulfur interlinks. In addition, monosulfide links give weaker products than polysulfide links. This paradoxical result—that inherently strong C−C interlinks give the weakest products, whereas inherently weak polysulfide links give the strongest products—is attributed to the fact that weak interlinks will break under stress before the main chain does, so that failure of the elastomer molecule itself is delayed.

Fillers

      Almost every conceivable material has been added to rubber in attempts to cheapen and stiffen it. Two particulate fillers are outstanding because they also strengthen elastomers to a remarkable degree. The most important, used almost universally, is finely divided carbon black, prepared by incomplete combustion of oil or gas. Carbon black consists of small, spherical particles having diameters of only 10–100 nanometres (10–100 billionths of a metre) and made up of concentric graphitic layers of carbon. The surface of the particles also contains some oxygen and hydrogen. During manufacture, chains of particles become fused together to create extended open “structures,” still very small in size.

      Another reinforcing filler with particles of similar shape and size is finely divided silica (silicon dioxide, SiO₂), prepared either by burning silicon tetrachloride or by acid precipitation from a sodium silicate solution.

      Both carbon black and silica, when added to a mix compound at a concentration of about 30 percent by volume, raise the elastic modulus of the rubber by a factor of two to three. They also confer remarkable toughness, especially resistance to abrasion, on otherwise weak materials such as SBR. If greater amounts are added, the modulus will be increased still further, but the strength will then begin to fall. Disadvantages of reinforcement with carbon black or silica are lower springiness (resilience) and a decrease in the initial high stiffness after flexing.

      For a filler to be reinforcing, it appears that the fundamental particles must be small—for instance, 10–50 nanometres in diameter—and that the elastomer must adhere well to them. If either of these conditions is absent, the reinforcing power will be lessened. Indeed, the smaller the particle size (and hence the greater the surface area), the greater is the observed reinforcing effect. It is still not understood how fine particles are able to confer high strength and toughness on elastomer compounds. Strengthening and toughening are possibly associated with debonding of highly stressed elastomer molecules from the filler particles, reducing the stress on the polymer chains and delaying catastrophic fracture.

Protective chemicals

      Certain additives confer resistance to heat, sunlight, oxygen, and ozone. Amines (amine), particularly paraphenylene diamines, are powerful retarders of oxidation, or antioxidants (antioxidant). Added to rubber compounds in small amounts (1–2 percent), they appear to disrupt the free-radical oxidation reactions that lead either to molecular rupture and softening or to increased interlinking and hardening as rubber ages. Hindered phenols (phenol), another antioxidant class, are less powerful than amines but have less tendency to stain light-coloured rubber compounds. Small amounts of certain metals, notably copper, manganese, and iron, act as powerful catalysts of oxidation; sequestering agents are therefore used to block the action of these elements if their presence is unavoidable.

      Atmospheric ozone reacts readily with elastomers containing C=C double bonds, leading to breakage of molecules lying in the surface. As a result, small, deep fissures, termed ozone cracks, are formed if the rubber is stretched slightly (by more than about 10 percent). Cracks one millimetre long appear in unprotected rubber after only a few weeks of exposure to a typical outdoor concentration of ozone, about 5 parts per 100 million. However, certain diamines (e.g., alkyl-aryl paraphenylene diamines) prevent cracking, probably by competing with the C=C bonds in rubber for reaction with ozone. These antiozonants “bloom” to the surface and react there, protecting the rubber. A few percent of an antiozonant is therefore commonly included in the mix formulation of rubber compounds based on unsaturated elastomers. An alternative method of protection, often employed simultaneously, is to include a few percent of a microcrystalline paraffin wax in the mix formulation. Because it is incompatible with the elastomer, the wax blooms to the surface and forms a protective skin.

Plasticizers and processing aids

      Liquids (liquid) are added to elastomer mixes in order to soften and plasticize the compound, either in processing or later in use. For example, elastomers with high glass transition temperatures (and correspondingly slow molecular motions) can be improved by adding low-temperature plasticizers—i.e., compatible liquids that act as internal lubricants. Plasticizers must have low vapour pressure and a high boiling point in order to be retained within the compound over long periods of service. Examples are aliphatic esters and phthalates. Phosphate plasticizers also confer a measure of flame resistance. Other liquids are added to rubber compounds as processing aids in order to make mixing and extrusion easier. Typically, 5 percent of a petroleum oil is used.

Processing

      Rubber processing consists of four basic steps: (1) mastication, when the elastomer is sheared and the molecules are broken down to give easier flow, (2) mixing, usually carried out immediately after mastication, when additives are incorporated, (3) shaping of the viscous mass, for example, by extrusion or molding, and (4) curing, when the polymer molecules become interlinked and the shape is fixed.

Mastication

 Mastication and softening are usually carried out in batches. The operation is done either in large, enclosed mixing machines or on rubber mills. The preeminent example of an enclosed machine is the Banbury (registered trademark) mixer, consisting of heavy steel counter-rotating paddles in an hourglass-shaped chamber, holding up to one-half ton of rubber (see Figure 3—>). Rubber mills have two large, horizontally opposed, closely spaced steel cylinders, up to 3 metres (10 feet) long, that are rotated slowly in opposite directions and at somewhat different speeds. Rubber is sheared and softened in the gap between the paddles and wall of the Banbury mixer and in the gap between the two cylinders in the roll mill.

Mixing

      Mixing is carried out on machines similar to those used in mastication, sometimes immediately after softening. Reactive materials, fillers, oils, and protective chemicals of various kinds, as described above, are incorporated into the base elastomer by a combined shearing and mixing action. An enclosed Banbury-type mixer can produce up to one-half ton of mixed compound in a few minutes. The compound is then sheeted out, coated with a release soap to prevent sticking, and stored until use on steel pallets that can hold up to one ton of rubber.

Shaping

      Shaping of the mixture into the desired form takes place in several ways. Extruders are used to produce long, continuous products such as tubing, tire treads, and wire coverings. They are also used to produce various profiles that can later be cut to length. Multiroll calenders are used to make wide sheeting. In transfer and injection molds, the rubber mix is forced through channels into a mold chamber of the required shape, where it is cured under pressure. Tires are made of several components: bead wire, sidewall compound, inner liner, cord plies, belt package, and tread; these are brought together and assembled as a complete tire before being transferred to the curing press.

Curing

      Curing is carried out in pressurized steel molds, which are heated by steam or electricity to temperatures at which the interlinking reaction takes place. Typical cure conditions are several minutes at a temperature of 160° C (320° F). Because heat penetrates rubber slowly, thick articles must be allowed longer curing times, up to several hours, at lower temperatures. Pressures of 1 megapascal (145 pounds per square inch) or more are normally imposed in order to maintain the desired shape and to force trapped air to dissolve in the compound. Other methods of curing the rubber mix after it has been shaped include steam heating in autoclaves, microwave irradiation, and passage through a heated bath of molten metal salts or a fluidized bed. In these cases curing is carried out at near-atmospheric pressure.

Additional Reading

Jacqueline I. Kroschwitz (ed.), Encyclopedia of Polymer Science and Engineering, 2nd ed., 17 vol. (1985–90), is the most comprehensive source of information on polymer science and includes articles on the major topics treated in this article; it is also available in a condensed, 1-vol. edition, Concise Encyclopedia of Polymer Science and Engineering (1990). Two additional reference works are Geoffrey Allen and John C. Bevington (eds.), Comprehensive Polymer Science: The Synthesis, Characterization, Reactions & Applications of Polymers, 7 vol. (1989); and Joseph C. Salamone (ed.), Polymeric Materials Encyclopedia, 12 vol. (1996). Books on polymer science for the nonscientific reader are Hans-Georg Elias, Mega Molecules (1987; originally published in German, 1985); and Raymond B. Seymour and Charles E. Carraher, Giant Molecules: Essential Materials for Everyday Living and Problem Solving (1990).Maurice Morton (ed.), Rubber Technology, 3rd ed. (1987), is a suitable introduction for persons entering the industry. Anil K. Bhowmick and Howard L. Stephens (eds.), Handbook of Elastomers: New Developments and Technology (1988), is a somewhat more advanced survey of rubber technology. Colin Barlow, Sisira Jayasuriya, and C. Suan Tan, The World Rubber Industry (1994), reviews the history and production of synthetic and natural rubber. James L. White, Rubber Processing: Technology, Materials, Principles (1995), describes and analyzes the processes used to manufacture rubber articles.J.A. Brydson, Rubbery Materials and Their Compounds (1988), reviews the science of rubber compounding, giving current recipes and the sometimes complex reasons behind them. Attilio Bisio, Synthetic Rubber: The Story of an Industry (1990), briefly recounts the chemical processes used to produce synthetic elastomers. The Vanderbilt Rubber Handbook, 13th ed., edited by Robert F. Ohm (1990), the standard reference for rubber technologists, provides information on materials, recipes, test methods, properties, and uses of rubber compounds. Alan N. Gent (ed.), Engineering with Rubber: How to Design Rubber Components (1992), surveys design principles for various products, showing how to select materials, to determine stiffness, strength, and durability in selected cases, and to specify manufacturing quality. Annual Book of ASTM Standards, section 9, Rubber, published by the American Society for Testing and Materials, has full details of standard test methods for rubber and rubber products, including hardness, strength, and resistance to heat. Worldwide Rubber Statistics (annual), published by the International Institute of Synthetic Rubber Producers, contains detailed information on the production and consumption of natural rubber and synthetic elastomers.Alan N. Gent

* * *