Elastomer blends mechanical properties analysis

After following the microhardness behaviour during the stress-induced polymorphic transition of homo-PBT and its multiblock copolymers attention is now focused on the deformation behaviour of a blend of PBT and a PEE thermoplastic elastomer, the latter being a copolymer of PBT and PEO. This system is attractive not only because the two polymers have the same crystallizable component but also because the copolymer, being an elastomer, strongly affects the mechanical properties of the blend. It should be mentioned that these blends have been well characterized by differential scanning calorimetry, SAXS, dynamic mechanical thermal analysis and static mechanical measurements (Apostolov et al, 1994). 

A morphological analysis revealed that the blends and composites which contain ethylene ethyl acrylate-maleic anhydride polymer exhibit a better elastomer phase dispersion with smaller domain sizes in comparison to the other elastomer. The addition of the carbon nanotubes also improves the mechanical properties of the samples for both elastomer types [83]. 

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