Study of the Thermal Oxidation of Butadiene-Nitrile Elastomers
Abstract 1. Processes of destruction and structure formation take place during the thermal oxidation of butadiene-nitrile rubbers. These processes take place simultaneously, and are the result of absorption of oxygen by the rubber molecules. The dominant process, which governs the changes in the physical and mechanical properties of rubber, is structure formation. 2. An essential difference between the behavior of vulcanizates of SKN-18 on the one hand, and of SKX-26 and SKN-40 on the other, is shown by heat oxidation and aging. Depending on the length of the induction period of oxidation inhibited by phenyl-2-naphthylamine, the nature of the consumption of inhibitor, and the rate of change of the equilibrium modulus, relaxation constant, and standard physical-mechanical properties during aging, the behavior of SKN-18 is practically the same as that of other butadiene polymers containing an equal number of double bonds in the main chains of the molecules. 3. It was established that, during thermal oxidation of butadiene-nitrile copolymers, acrylonitrile chains of the rubber molecules undergo conversion. 4. The formation of a certain quantity of substances soluble in methyl and ethyl alcohol during oxidation of nitrile rubbers is revealed, and it is established that substances present in these byproducts can inhibit the oxidation of rubber. 5. The resistance of butadiene-nitrile rubbers to thermal inhibited oxidation and aging of vulcanizates, which is greater than that of other butadiene rubbers, is explained by the formation from the rubber itself, during oxidation, of substances which are, in combination with phenyl-2-naphthylamine, very strong inhibitors of the oxidation process.