Sorption and diffusion of aromatic penetrants into natural rubber blends

Sorption and diffusion of aromatic hydrocarbon penetrants through different NR blends such as NR/BIIR, MU CW, NR/neoprene, NR/EPDM, NR/polybutadiene and NR/SBR have been studied. The diffusion coefficient (D) of aromatic penetrants range from 6.8 to 84.3 x 10(-8) cm(2)/s at a temperature range of 25-60 degrees C. Transport data are affected by the nature of the interacting solvent molecule rather than its size and also by the structural variations of the elastomers blended with NR. Chlorobenzene and bromobenzene have shown higher transport data compared to nitrobenzene penetrant. The temperature dependence of the transport coefficient has been used to estimate the activation parameters from the Arrhenius plots. The activation parameters for the diffusion of aromatic penetrants range from 4.16 to 30.48 kJ/mol. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.