LANXESS continues to promote sustainability credentials, this time at the IRC

At the International Rubber Conference (IRC), taking place in Nuremberg, Germany, 27-30 June, LANXESS will be showcasing its broad range of additives for the rubber processing industry.

In the spirit of advancing sustainability, the focus will be on not only rubber production but also the manufacture of high-quality, long-lasting rubber products designed for a range of applications.  

The lifetime is an important indicator for the performance of rubber products. The S-SBR/BR–silica mixtures used in tyres, for example, can cause the tread to start “post-vulcanising” during its service life, leading to changes in the molecular network and gradual hardening. Additives such as Perkalink and Vulcuren from LANXESS enable tyre manufacturers to develop and produce mixtures designed to deliver ultra-high performance over their entire service life. 

Dr Hermann-Josef Weidenhaupt, a specialist in rubber additives at LANXESS, will hold a presentation entitled “Perkalink 900 – The Smart Solution for Sulfur and Peroxide Crosslinking”, in which he will explain the specific qualities of this anti-reversion agent in relation to cross-linking.

In sulfur-vulcanised mixtures, Perkalink 900’s qualities include long-lasting heat stability by forming new stable carbon-carbon bonds instead of sulfur bridges, which can potentially break down due to reversion processes during vulcanisation or during the course of usage. It is used in many sulfur-vulcanised rubbers such as NR, IR, SBR, and BR or blends of these elastomers in order to achieve improved reversion resistance even at high-temperature vulcanisation. 

When precursors are recovered from rubber products, the extreme heat in combination with the mechanical or chemical stress break up the polymer chains, leading to a significant deterioration in the mechanical properties. This is why a special process is required during devulcanisation in which only the sulfur bridges formed during vulcanisation are destroyed. This is based on the lower binding energy of the S–S and C–S bridges (S = sulfur; C = carbon), where mechanical properties remain largely unaffected.