Solubility of Sulfur and Dithiocarbamates in Natural Rubber
Abstract Knowledge of equilibrium solubilities of sulfur and accelerators in rubbers at various temperatures allows prediction of whether blooming is possible in particular compounds or products. Reliable data of this nature for natural rubber appeared not to exist in the literature. Immersion of 1 mm thick sheets of peroxide-vulcanized natural rubber in both liquid and, more surprisingly, powdered solid curatives was found to be an adequate method for measuring solubilities. The same experimental method also enabled some diffusion data to be obtained. Solubilities of sulfur, zinc diethyldithiocarbamate (ZDEC) and zinc di-n-butyl dithiocarbamate (ZDBC) were determined at various temperatures between 23° and 135°C. The experimental results did not agree well with the theory which had previously been found to describe the solubility of waxes in natural rubber. This theory, which is a combination of the Flory-Huggins Equation with an expression for the latent heat of fusion, was modified to take into account the dependence of the interaction parameter on temperature and on degree of swelling. The new expression gave much better agreement with the experimental results for all three substances.