Blending poly(vinyl chloride) with used rubber tire

Abstract

The recycled tire rubbers, ground tire rubber (GRT) and reclaimed tire rubber (RTR), were separately blended with either soft PVC or rigid PVC. In case of soft PVC, low loading of recycled tire rubber was resulted with very low tensile strength comparing to rigid PVC. The surface modification of both GRT and RTR via chlorination reaction using 3% w/v of trichloroisocyanuric acid (TCICA) in methanol afforded chlorinated GRT (Cl-GRT) and chlorinated RTR (Cl-RTR). Both modified and unmodified tire rubbers were added to rigid PVC (R-PVC). It was observed that the optimum loading of unmodified tire rubber was 40 and 30 phr for GRT and RTR, respectively, whereas the modified tire rubber was 50 and 40 phr for Cl-GRT and Cl-RTR, respectively. All these four blends exhibited the highest impact strength of the individual series. The terpolymer blends were also investigated by adding the other rubber, chlorosulfonated polyethylene (CSPE) or nitrile butadiene rubber (NBR), to the mixture of R-PVC and recycled tire rubber. The proper blending ratios of R-PVC/C1-GRT/NBR at 100/50/30 and R-PVC/C1-RTR/CSPE at 100/40/30, gave the highest impact strength.