Peel strength and fatigue resistance of AEM rubber–polyester fabric composites (I): application of isocyanate adhesive solution

Abstract

In this research, the adhesion between ethylene methyl acrylic (AEM) rubber and polyester fabric treated with isocyanate and the fatigue properties of the AEM rubber–polyester fabric composites were examined. Experiments were conducted according to the concentrations of isocyanate adhesive solution in order to determine the optimum concentration of the adhesive agent and the results showed that adhesion was the most superior when 14% solution was applied and this was also confirmed by Scanning electron microscope morphology. Moreover, the impregnated polyester fabric was treated at 120, 170, 200, and 230 °C and peel test was conducted in order to determine the optimum curing condition. The results showed that adhesion was the most superior when the polyester fabric was cured for 2 min at 230 °C. It was judged that this resulted from the network structure of isocyanate and the formation of carbodiimide structure at the curing temperature of 230 °C. Comparing to the fatigue properties of the rubber–fabric composites from single dip system and the double dip system, the crack number and the accumulated crack length, the crack propagation was lower when the double dip system was applied. This resulted from the flexibility of the interphase of the polyester fabric–AEM rubber composites by the application of resorcinol-formaldehyde-latex (RFL).