Toughness improvement of LLDPE/PP blend by GTR incorporation

CAREN ROSALES; NOURREDINE AÏT HOCINE; CELINA BERNAL; VALERIA PETTARIN

Kerala

Conferencia; Fifth International Online Conference on Reuse and Recycling of Materials (Polymers, Wood, Paper, Leather, Glass, Metals, Ceramics, Semi Conductors, Water etc) and their products ICRM ? 2020; 2020

In this work, we report results of adding GTR to a LLDPE/PP blend (the most abundant thermoplastics in municipal waste), with the aim of obtaining a completely recycled composite with improved toughness. GTR particles in different size ranges ? lower than 300 µm, 300-500 µm and 500-800 µm ? and in various percentages ? 5, 10 and 15% ? were incorporated to a 75% LLDPE / 25% PP blend. We found that GTR particles did not affect the microstructure of the thermoplastic matrix. The tensile behavior of the ternary materials was slightly affected by the composition of the mixture: the mechanical behavior became less rigid and more ductile, this being directly related to the elastic nature of the rubber particles. However, large differences were found in the fracture performance of the ternary blends, when compared with the matrix blend. In addition, different mechanical behaviors were observed that varied according to the relative percentage of the particles and their size. GTR greatly influenced both energies involved in crack initiation and in crack propagation, as well as mechanisms developed during deformation and crack evolution.