Interesting green elastomeric composites: Silk textile reinforced natural rubber

The reinforcement of natural rubber (NR) with particles and fibres enables their use in even high performance applications, such as in road-racing bicycle tire casings. Here, for the first time, we examine the potential of silk textiles as reinforcements in NR to produce a fully-green, flexible yet strengthened elastomeric composite material. Various material properties were evaluated and compared with similar nylon textile reinforced NR composites. Two types of NR were used: whole and purified natural rubbers. The composite samples were prepared by sandwiching a single layer of textile between layers of NR. NR/silk composites exhibited higher static and dynamic mechanical properties than NR/nylon composites. In addition, silk textiles in whole NR composites performed significantly better than purified NR composites, due to stronger fibre/matrix adhesion and better wettability in the former, as indicated by surface energy measurements and scanning electron microscopy micrographs. Such bio-based natural rubber/silk composites might find interesting applications in soft robotics and as flexible, inflatable tubes.This work was supported and funded by the EXPERTS4Asia (Erasmus Mundus), the Oxford Silk Group at University of Oxford, the Thailand Research Fund (TRF RDC5850004) and Kasetsart University (Thailand). We also thank the US Air Force Office for Scientific Research (AFOSR Grant Number F49620-03-1-0111) and the European Research Council Advanced Grant (SP2-GA-2008-233409) for generous funding. We acknowledge Chul Thai Silk Co., Ltd for providing silk fabric, and Asia Fiber Co., Ltd. for providing nylon fabric.This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Elsevier at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.polymertesting.2016.08.007

Approaches toward High Resilience Rubber Foams: Morphology–Mechanics–Thermodynamics Relationships

Natural rubber foam (NRF) products are frequently required in high resilience or high shape recoverability applications, which is in contrast to the fundamental nature of NRF. This study aims to improve NRF properties, such as recovery, by increasing the amount of vulcanizing chemicals (Vc) and adding cassava starch (Cs). Interestingly, increasing the amount of Vc and Cs improves mechanical properties and shape recoverability of NRF although the morphology of NRF with various concentrations of Cs is similar. The ratio of internal energy to the compression force is almost constant with various amounts of Vc and Cs because the degree of freedom of the rubber chains remains stable. NRF possesses better compression strength and shape recoverability with increasing amount of Vc (optimum of 16 phr) and Cs (optimum of 8 phr). Cassava starch is discovered as an attractive filler in comparison to traditional NRF fillers, such as charcoal and silica, due to its relatively low density

Raman technique application for rubber blends characterization

Raman spectroscopy has been employed in a number of studies to examine the morphological changes in a variety of materials. It is a non-destructive analysis method and an equally useful method for the investigation of material structure. Recently, Raman spectroscopy has been developed to employ as an imaging instrumentation. Sample surface scanning in X- and Y-axis and sample depth (Z-axis) can be carried out by modifying the focus of the laser beam from the Raman microscope. Therefore, three-dimensional images can be thus built by using special software. The surface and bulk properties of immiscible rubber blend were investigated by Raman spectroscopy. The results obtained by Raman spectroscopy were in good agreement with those of Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM). The combination of Raman spectrometry and SEM clearly elucidates the identification of phases between the dispersed phase and the matrix (continuous phase) of the immiscible rubber blends

Interesting green elastomeric composites: silk textile reinforced natural rubber

The reinforcement of natural rubber (NR) with particles and fibres enables their use in even high performance applications, such as in road-racing bicycle tire casings. Here, for the first time, we examine the potential of silk textiles as reinforcements in NR to produce a fully-green, flexible yet strengthened elastomeric composite material. Various material properties were evaluated and compared with similar nylon textile reinforced NR composites. Two types of NR were used: whole and purified natural rubbers. The composite samples were prepared by sandwiching a single layer of textile between layers of NR. NR/silk composites exhibited higher static and dynamic mechanical properties than NR/nylon composites. In addition, silk textiles in whole NR composites performed significantly better than purified NR composites, due to stronger fibre/matrix adhesion and better wettability in the former, as indicated by surface energy measurements and scanning electron microscopy micrographs. Such bio-based natural rubber/silk composites might find interesting applications in soft robotics and as flexible, inflatable tubes

Interesting green elastomeric composites: silk textile reinforced natural rubber

The reinforcement of natural rubber (NR) with particles and fibres enables their use in even high performance applications, such as in road-racing bicycle tire casings. Here, for the first time, we examine the potential of silk textiles as reinforcements in NR to produce a fully-green, flexible yet strengthened elastomeric composite material. Various material properties were evaluated and compared with similar nylon textile reinforced NR composites. Two types of NR were used: whole and purified natural rubbers. The composite samples were prepared by sandwiching a single layer of textile between layers of NR. NR/silk composites exhibited higher static and dynamic mechanical properties than NR/nylon composites. In addition, silk textiles in whole NR composites performed significantly better than purified NR composites, due to stronger fibre/matrix adhesion and better wettability in the former, as indicated by surface energy measurements and scanning electron microscopy micrographs. Such bio-based natural rubber/silk composites might find interesting applications in soft robotics and as flexible, inflatable tubes