Electron beam crosslinking of non-lead PVC formulations

PVC samples with lead-free and lead-base stabilizer, containing TMPTMA (trimethylolpropane trimethacrylate) as a crosslinker and DOP (2-ethylhexyl phthalate) as a plasticizer, were electron beam treated at different doses (2–200 kGy) and characterized to evaluate crosslinking and other several properties, as a continuation of our previously reported paper, where these PVC formulations, typical for wire and cable applications, underwent gamma irradiation. The PVC was formulated with two different stabilizing systems: Ca/Zn and dibasic lead phthalate for comparison, to use them as jackets for a 22 wire gage (AWG). Small samples of the jacketed wires were irradiated in an industrial Dynamitron electron accelerator for the corresponding doses, along with two dosimetric systems: radiochromic thin film and alanine pellets dosimeters. The maximum dose applied was decided as the crosslinking increased, until the gel content was stable. The dose of 200 kGy was the condition for the highest crosslinking, so most of the wire was irradiated at such dose. Chemical and mechanical evaluations were carried out to the irradiated wire. The results show that 200 kGy was too high dose for the materials, since an important degradation is observed for the Ca/Zn systems. Unfortunately, such dose affects basically to CaZn formulations, which showed much poorer performance than classical lead-containing compositions. The results also indicate that gel content is not the best way of deciding the optimum condition for irradiation.