This work focuses on the melt processing of nanocomposite materials obtained from a synthetic lamellar filler, α-zirconium phosphate (α-ZrP), dispersed within a synthetic rubber of the SBR type. The first step is the melt compounding using aqueous slurry of α-ZrP without any treatment. Following, several kinds of surface modifiers such as sodium cation, alkylamines and tetrabutylammonium hydroxide and different melt processing conditions are investigated to improve the level of dispersion of ZrP platelets into the matrix. X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy and dynamical mechanical method are used as a multi-scale analysis to quantify the state of dispersion of the filler within the nanocomposite. Several mechanisms of dispersion are described depend on the surface modifying treatment and the melt processing parameters and the structure-properties relationship are studied. A comparison between the material reinforcement and two models of predictions, Krieger-Dougherty and Halpin-Tsai are discussed
Melt compounding of elastomer-zirconium phosphate nanocomposite : mechanisms of dispersion and processing