Synthetic rubber industry

P. M. Norling, "Managing Technology Critical Questions for the Synthetic Rubber Industry," 29th Mnnual Meeting International Institute of Synthetic... 

Carbon black is an extremely fine powder of great commercial importance, especially for the synthetic rubber industry. The addition of carbon black to tires lengthens its life extensively by increasing the abrasion and oil resistance of rubber. 

Yu, M. Hecheng Xiangjiao Gongye (Synthetic Rubber Industry) 1980, 169. 

Occupational health and safety in the rubber industry is discussed with reference to UK, US and European legislation. The review covers both natural and synthetic rubber industries. The first section outlines the laws affecting health and safety in the industry and the remainder presents specific health and safety issues of interest to employers and employees. Industrial safety is examined with reference to equipment, fire and explosions, solvents, epidemiology, NR latex allergy, skin irritations and dermatitis, dust and fume control, work-related musculoskeletal disorders, nitrosamines, 1,3-butadiene, and handling of rubber chemicals. 484 refs. 

Macaluso M, Larson R, Delzell E, et al Leukemia and cumulative exposure to butadiene, styrene and benzene among workers in the synthetic rubber industry. Toxicology 113 190-202, 1996... 

Emulsion polymerization was first employed during World War II for producing synthetic rubbers from 1,3-butadiene and styrene. This was the start of the synthetic rubber industry in the United States. It was a dramatic development because the Japanese naval forces threatened access to the southeast Asian natural-rubber (NR) sources, which were necessary for the war effort. Synthetic mbber has advanced significantly from the first days of balloon tires, which had a useful life of 5000 mi to present-day tires, which are good for 40,000 mi or more. Emulsion polymerization is presently the predominant process for the commercial polymerizations of vinyl acetate, chloroprene, various acrylate copolymerizations, and copolymerizations of butadiene with styrene and acrylonitrile. It is also used for methacrylates, vinyl chloride, acrylamide, and some fluorinated ethylenes. 

The paper industry uses large amounts of the sodium salt of rosin as paper size, which accounts for the greatest single use of rosin. The synthetic rubber industry is the second most important user of rosin. In making styrene-butadiene rubber, disproportionated rosin soaps are used alone or in combination with fatty acid soaps as emulsifiers in the polymerization process. Disproportionation decreases the number of double bonds in the abietic acid of the rosin, making a more stable material. 

Mileshkevich V.P. and Yuzhelevski Yu.A., Properties of Oxygen-Containing Silicon Compo-unds. Synthetic Rubber Industry, TsNIITEneftekhim, Moscow, 1977, p. 51. (Rus)... 

Butadiene is used as a chemical intermediate and as a polymer component in the synthetic rubber industry, the latter accounting for 75% of the butadiene produced. Styrene-butadiene rubber, polybutadiene rubber, adiponitrile, styrene-butadiene latex, acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene resins, and nitrile rubber are used in the manufacture of tires, nylon products, plastic bottles and food wraps, molded rubber goods, latex adhesives, carpet backing and pads, shoe soles, and medical devices. 

Butadiene is a widely used intermediate in the synthetic rubber industry. Exposure to it has been associated with the onset of leukemia J43 ... 

Delzell E, Sathiakumar N, Graff J, et al. An updated study of mortality among North American synthetic rubber industry workers. Res Rep Health Eff Inst 2006 132 65-74. 

Styrene-butadiene rubber (SBR) is a random polymer made from butadiene and styrene monomers. It possesses good mechanical property, processing behavior, and can be used like natural rubber. Moreover, some properties such as wear and heat resistance, aging, and curing property are even better than in natural rubber. Styrene-butadiene rubber was the first major synthetic rubber to be produced commercially. Now it has become the most common rubber with the largest production and consumption in the synthetic rubber industry. It can be widely used in tire, adhesive tape, cables, medical instruments, and all kinds of rubberware. 

Reaction of j -naphthol with chloroacetic acid in aqueous alkaline solution gives 2-naphthoxyacetic acid which is used as a growth promoter for fruits. The largest single use of j -naphthol has been reported for synthetic rubber industry as an antioxidant. 

With the advent of the synthetic rubber industry at the beginning of World War II, articles began to appear on the commercial production and separation of butadiene. Articles on the progress of butadiene production appeared, but security regulations limited the amount of technical information given. More specific information was divulged after the war, and improvements in the processes, catalysts used, and equipment continue to appear in the literature. Selected references are listed under Butadiene in the bibliography. 

The rapid development of the synthetic rubber industry throughout the war-torn world in the 1950s established the need for some organisation in which the issues of mutual interest could be discussed between the operating synthetic rubber plants in various countries. As a result the International Institute of Synthetic Rubber Producers was constituted, having its main office located in New York, USA. 

L. Xiaohua, K. Maoqing, W. Xinkui, China Synthetic Rubber Industry, 2001, 24, 3,147. 

The elastic response of elastomers has been the subject of a great deal of study by many investigators because of its very great technological importance as well as its intrinsic scientific interest. Starting from one material, namely natural rubber, the development of polymerization techniques has resulted in a host of substances that may properly be called rubbers, and a giant synthetic-rubber industry has developed to exploit them commercially. The term "elastomer" has become the generic scientific name for a rubbery material. 

Lithium alkyls are important catalysts in the synthetic rubber industry for the stereospecific polymerization of alkenes. 

During World War I German chemists, whose coxmoy was cut off from its sources of natural rubber by the British blockade, polymerized 3-methyl-isoprene (2,3-dimethyl-1,3-butadiene) units, (CH2=C(CH3)C(CH3)=CH2), obtained from acetone, to form an inferior substitute called methyl rubber. By the end of the war Germany was producing 15 tons (13.6 metric tons) of this rubber per month. The USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics), which built a pilot plant at Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) in 1930 and three factories in 1932 and 1933, was the first country to institute a full-scale synthetic rubber industry. 

During World War II the United States, cut off from India, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), Malaysia, and the Dutch East Indies (areas which, since the late nineteenth century, had replaced South America as the main suppliers of natural rubber), developed several superior synthetic rubbers. The U.S. synthetic rubber industry originated from two discoveries that were serendipitous that is, they occurred while the researchers were searching for something else. 

USE Manuf medicinal organics, dyes, perfumes the largest single use is probably in making antioxidants for the synthetic rubber industry. 

V.I. Anosova, Promyshkrmost sinteticheskogo Kauchuka (Synthetic Rubber Industry), Vol. 1, TsNIITENeftekhim, Moscow, 1966, p. 34. 

The creation of a synthetic rubber industry in the United States was a cooperative endeavor of many petroleum, chemical, and rubber companies. On a war-emergency basis between 1941 and 1944, elastomer production increased from 8,100 to 790,000 tons per year. This major technological accomplishment had much significance of a political and economic nature. By 1957, production capacity of the industry had increased to over 1,200,-000 tons per year. 

The development of highly reinforcing furnace blacks paralleled the creation of the synthetic-rubber industry. Improved cold butadiene-styrene elastomers reinforced with these new blacks give vulcanizates that are superior to natural rubb m tire treads. 

The importance of synthetic rubber industrially is determined by the price at which natural rubber can be bought. At present (March, 1922) the latter sells for such a low price that the synthetic product can not compete with it. 

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