Making of a rubber compound

PRODUCTION

15/09/2014

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MAKING OF A RUBBER COMPOUND

Each compound is made as per a specific recipe.
The raw materials have to be stored under certain temperature conditions protected from sunlight in order to avoid oxidation
processes. Natural rubber may need to be decristallized before it is used.
The mixing is similar to making a cake. All ingredients are weighed with high accuracy according to a formula and then mixed
together. The number of raw materials is quite high (eventually a dozen).
In the mixer all the ingredients are well distributed and dispersed. Still being unvulcanized resp. plastic, a maximum storage has to be
kept.
The raw rubber batches are then usually processed into cover sheets either in a calender for textile conveyor belts or in an extruder
for steel cord conveyor belts.
After confectioning the rubber sheets with the tensile member, the entire matrix is cured in a press, initializing the vulcanization.
The vulcanization is a chemical process in which individual polymer molecules are linked to other polymer molecules by atomic
bridges. The end result is that the springy rubber molecules become locked together. This makes the bulk material harder, much
more durable and also more resistant to chemical attack. It also transforms the surface of the material from a sticky feel to a smooth
surface.
This irreversible cure reaction defines cured rubber compounds as thermoset materials, which do not melt on heating, and places
them outside the class of thermoplastic materials (like polyethylene, polypropylene and PVC). This is a fundamental difference
between rubbers and plastics.
Usually, the actual chemical cross-linking is done with sulfur, but there are other technologies, including peroxide-based systems.
The combined cure package in a typical rubber compound comprises the cure agent itself (sulfur or peroxide), together with
accelerators and retarding agents.
Sulphur is an unusual material. Given the right circumstances, it will form chains composed of strings of its own atoms. The curing
process makes use of this phenomenon. Along the rubber molecule, there are a number of sites which are attractive to sulfur atoms.
These are called cure sites. At each cure site on the rubber molecule, a sulfur atom can attach itself, and from there, a sulfur chain
can grow, until it eventually reaches a cure site on another rubber molecule. These sulfur bridges are typically between 2 and 10
atoms long.
Rubber is an elastic hydrocarbon polymer which occurs as a natural milky colloidal suspension (latex) or is being made synthetically through
polymerization of monomers.
The first trace of rubber was found in a coal mine in Germany. It was not from a rubber tree. But, believed to be some 60.000 years old, still had some
elasticity (true?).
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