Effect of fillers on the compatibility of polymer blends

Abstract

AbstractThe effects of carbon black, talc, and ultrafine silica filler, at different filler, loading, on the compatibility of two binary blends was examined. These were, the mechanically compatible polyurethane (PU)/poly(vinyl chloride) (PVC) at 25/75 weight ratio, and the poly(ε‐caprolactone) (PCL)/styrene–acylonitrile (SAN) copolymer (with 30% AN content), at the 50/50 blend composition. For the former system, both dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) and DSC measurements indicated that, depending on the filler surface, boundary layers are formed at the filler–matrix interface shifting the PU relaxation to higher temperatures. No significant effect was observed for the PVC component. Though the mechanical spectra are also affected, essentially no Tg shifts were observed for the PCL–SAN system. A qualitative explanation of selective filler activity towards the blend components was given by invoking the matrix–filler basic–acidic nature. Overall, the fillers had no compatibilizing effect on the blend. Using available theory both DSC and the DMA techniques agree in their estimate of the boundary layer thickness. Moduli data were also analyzed using mechanics models proposed for composite systems.