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The variation of structure and property of sorbitol-treated NR vulcanizates with increasing the silica loading

  • Polymers & biopolymers
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Abstract

The endeavour of producing a green tyre tread compound with high silica loading is still a daunting task for all tyre industries globally. The presence of non-rubber constituents, i.e. protein and phospholipid in natural rubber (NR), disrupts the silanization reaction in the silica-filled NR composite. To get rid of that vital issue, an optimized quantity bio-based sugar alcohol “sorbitol” was introduced at the early stage of mixing as a blocking agent, for improving the silica dispersion and producing a green and sustainable tyre tread compound. A significant improvement in technical key properties like tensile strength, reinforcement index, ARI (abrasion resistance index) (~ 9%), HBU (heat build-up) (5 to 8 unit), and rolling resistance (8 to 9% reduction) was evident in sorbitol-treated NR compound, even at higher loading of silica (i.e. silica/CB: 45/5). The functional groups of NR non-rubber substance intervention interrupt the homogeneous filler dispersion, which is verified by the investigation of Payne effect and detailed morphological analysis. The constitutive modelling of the 30 phr silica-loaded sorbitol-treated and untreated NR vulcanizates was performed and fitted to find the best material model based on the correlation factor (R2 = 0.999). Subsequently, by using Ogden material model constants (N = 4) the cross-link density of all the samples was calculated and compared with their trend of Young’s modulus. Based on the overall performances, 30 phr silica-loaded sorbitol-treated compound with 20 phr carbon black was envisaged to be the best compound for tyre tread application.* As cited in Ref [38]

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to acknowledge the Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur and Apollo Tyres Pvt. Ltd, Chennai, for their financial support and all kinds of facilities. The authors are also thankful to the Central Research Facility of IIT Kharagpur for carrying out the different characterization of the samples. The author also likes to thank Mr. Rajesh De, Junior Technician/Junior Laboratory Assistant, Rubber Technology Centre, IIT Kharagpur.

Funding

The authors acknowledge the Ministry of Education, India, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, India, and Apollo Tyres Ltd. Chennai, India (Grant Number: IIT/SRIC/RT/TRF/2018–19/288), for funding and financial support during the course of this work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Rubber Technology Centre, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, Kharagpur, 721302, West Bengal, India

    Abhijit Bera, Mohit Goswami, Debabrata Ganguly & Santanu Chattopadhyay

  2. Apollo Tyres Limited, Chennai, 600018, Tamil Nadu, India

    Jyoti Prakash Rath, S. Ramakrishnan, Job Kuriakose & S. K. P. Amarnath

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Abhijit Bera was involved in conceptualization, writing the original draft, and writing—reviewing and editing; Mohit Goswami and Debabrata Ganguly were responsible for writing—reviewing and editing, and methodology; Jyoti Prakash Rath, S. Ramakrishnan, and Job Kuriakose contributed to project administration; S. K. P. Amarnath took part in writing—reviewing and editing; and Santanu Chattopadhyay participated in supervision.

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Correspondence to Santanu Chattopadhyay.

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Bera, A., Goswami, M., Ganguly, D. et al. The variation of structure and property of sorbitol-treated NR vulcanizates with increasing the silica loading. J Mater Sci 58, 996–1011 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-022-08092-w

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10853-022-08092-w

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