SIMULTANEOUS SAXS／WAXS／DSC STUDIES ON MICROSTRUCTURE OF CONVENTIONAL AND METALLOCENE-BASED ETHYLENE-BUTENE COPOLYMERS

The fractions of one metallocene-based (mPE) and one conventional (znPE) ethylene-butene copolymer eluted at 80-82℃ from temperature rising elution fractionation were selected for DSC and time-resolved small angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) and wide angle X-ray scattering (WAXS) characterization. The DSC and WAXS results show that two crystal structures exist in both mPE and znPE: structure A with higher melting temperature and structure B with lower melting temperature. It was found that original znPE (s-znPE) contains more highly ordered structure A than original mPE (s-mPE) in spite of the higher comonomer content of znPE. Another structure C is also identified because of higher crystallinity measured by WAXS than by DSC and is attributed to the interfacial region. The SAXS data were analyzed with correlation function and two maxima were observed in s-mPE and s-znPE, in agreement with the conclusion of two crystal populations drawn from DSC and WAXS results. These two crystal populatiorts have close long periods in s-mPE, but very different long periods in s-znPE. In contrast, freshly crystallized mPE and znPE (f-mPE and f-znPE) contain only a single crystal population with a broader distribution of long period     

CRYSTALLIZATION AND MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF BLENDS OF METALLOCENE SHORT CHAIN BRANCHED POLYETHYLENE WITH CONVENTIONAL POLYOLEFINS

Metallocene-catalyzed short chain branched polyethylene (SCBPE) was blended with LDPE, HDPE, PS, EPDM and iPP in the weight proportions of 80 and 20. The crystallization and mechanical properties of these blends were studied by PLM, DSC and DMA. It has been observed in PLM that SCBPE/LDPE, SCBPE/HDPE and SCBPE/EPDM can form band spherulites whose band width and size are both smaller than that of the pure SCBPE. Tiny crystallites are observed in the completely immiscible SCBPE/PS blend. The crystallites in SCBPE/iPP are very small and only irregular spherulites are seen. The crystallization kinetics and mechanical properties of SCBPE are greatly affected by the second polyolefin, but in a different way, depending on the phase behavior and the modulus of the second components. SCBPE may be phase miscible in the melt with HDPE, LDPE and EPDM and co-crystallize together with HDPE or LDPE during cooling. A big change of crystal morphology and crystallization kinetics is seen in SCBPE/iPP blend compared with pure SCBPE and the lowest tanδ is also seen for this system. DMA results show that the tensile modulus of the blends has nothing to do with phase behavior, but only depends on the modulus of the second component.