Radiation Induced Grafting of Acrylate onto Waste Rubber: The Effect of Monomer Type

Abstract

The effect of three different acrylate group monomers, namely n-butyl acrylate, methacrylic acid and tripropylene glycol diacrylate of radiation induced grafting onto waste rubber was studied. The electron beam accelerator operated at voltage of 2MeV was used to irradiate the waste rubber at 10 kGy and 100 kGy absorbed radiation dose, respectively. The formation of grafting was observed from the increase in the grafting yield and confirmed by Transformed Infra-Red Spectroscopy results. According to the result obtained, only tripropylene glycol diacrylate was selected to graft onto waste rubber. The carbonyl bond from acrylate groups was seen at 1726 cm-1 band which confirmed the presence of TPGDA in the polymer matrix. This indicates the successful preparation of the TPGDA-grafted waste rubber via radiation induced grafting techniques.