Abstract
Lightly crosslinked natural rubber (NR) networks have been characterized by equilibrium swelling in toluene. A good agreement between the equilibrium swelling crosslink-junction densities (μE) and the values expected from the stoichiometry of dicumyl peroxide decomposition (μc) has been obtained using Flory's early equation of state. The applicable value of χ = 0.37 was found to compare equally well and is in tandem with the previously reported literature values of χ = 0.391 and χ = 0.35 from swelling and heat of mixing measurements, respectively. At low crosslink-junction densities i.e., μE ≤ 4.2 mM.l−1 corresponding on average to 4 crosslink-junctions per cis 1,4-poly-isoprene chain and below, network formation is found to be incomplete. The approach used also provides a simple way of differentiating lightly crosslinked networks from the state of gelation.
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