Dependencies of Material Properties on Molecular Weight Distribution of Industrial Polyethylenes

Abstract

We studied the dependence of material properties on molecular weight distribution (MWD) of polymers using high-density-polyethylenes (without short branch chain) with a wide range of molecular weights and known MWD. We discussed the correlations of harmonic-, the arithmetic-, and geometric-mean of MWD with each material properties of melt index, high load melt index, elongation at break, failure point, density, Charpy impact residence, and yield stress. The former four properties were governed by the arithmetic mean of MWD whereas the latter three properties were controlled by the geometric mean of MWD.