The Chemistry of Vulcanization. X. Accelerating Mechanism of Sulfenamide Type Accelerators
Abstract The mechanism of acceleration of the commercial sulfenamide MSNR2 (NR2 denotes cyclohexylamino or morpholino and M denotes 2-benzothiazolyl) was studied by using diphenylmethane (DPM) as a model of rubber hydrocarbon. Since amine (NHR2) liberated from MSNR2 complicated the reaction, the results obtained here were compared and correlated with those using the simple sulfenamide MSNH2. The preceding paper reported that ammonia evolved from MSNH2 did not disturb the reaction. The reaction mechanism of MSNR2 in DPM both in the presence and absence of sulfur appear to be the same as those of MSNH2 respectively, though difficulties of the identification and determination of the products did not permit a clear-cut conclusion. In the DPM-sulfur-MSNR2-zinc butyrate system, MBT produced from sulfenamide via 2-benzothiazolylsulfenyl radical interacts with zinc butyrate to give zinc salt of MBT (MSZnSM). This compound, on the one hand, suffers induced decomposition by sulfur to give benzothiazolyl-sulfenyl radical again, and on the other hand, interacts with the radical ·NR2 to yield MNR2. The delayed action of MSNR2 was interpreted by induced decomposition only by ⋅Sx⋅ as compared with that of MSZnSM both by S8 and ⋅Sx⋅. The accelerating entity of the sulfenamide is the 2-benzothiazolylsulfenyl radical, which splits the S8 ring molecule, as in the case of other thiazole type accelerators. However, amine librated from the sulfenamide also is considered to accelerate the vulcanization.