Study of nucleation activity and application of a nucleating agent to copolypropylene

Abstract

AbstractThe influences of nucleating agent content on crystallization peak temperature, crystallization curve shape, crystallization onset temperature, and crystallinity of a copolypropylene were studied in detail by differential scanning calorimetry. The results showed that crystallization onset temperature and crystallization peak temperature increased 17°C–22°C and 15°C–19°C, respectively, with increasing nucleating agent content. The behavior of the nucleating agent showed excellent efficiency. But the shape of the crystallization curve broadened with increasing nucleating agent content, and the crystallinity came to an extremum when the nucleating agent content was 0.2%. These results generally differed from those for crystallization of i‐PP by a nucleating agent. Modification of copolypropylene was studied by use of a nucleating agent, and the characteristics of the effects of the nucleating agent on copolypropylene were mastered. The results showed that the hardness of a copolypropylene improved observably. So the abrasion resistance of biaxially oriented polypropylene (BOPP) film for cigarette packaging was improved by adopting the modified copolypropylene as the skin‐layer heat‐seal material of BOPP film. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 101:3915–3919, 2006