RHEOLOGICAL AND DIELECTRIC CHANGES DURING ISOTHERMAL EPOXY-AMINE CURE

Dynamic viscosity and ionic conductivity were measured simultaneously during the cure of a digylcidyl ether of bisphenol-A (DGEBA) epoxy resin with diamino-diphenyl sulfone (DDS) by mounting a microdielectric sensor into the plates of a rheometer. Two different cure temperatures were examined. Periodically, throughout the cure, samples were removed from the plates of the rheometer, quenched, and analyzed for the glass transition temperature and epoxide conversion. The relationship between conductivity and viscosity appeared to be independent of cure temperature. A linear relation with a slope of -1 was observed between the natural logarithms of conductivity and viscosity during the cure up to approximately 85% cure conversion. It was hypothesized that the reaction rate was hindered by diffusion at this stage in the polymerization. A free volume relationship was used to successfully correlate conductivity with viscosity up to the diffusion limited region. (C) 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.