Effect of environmental conditions on Shore hardness values of polymer blend

Abstract

The current investigation was carried to study and determine the values of
shore D hardness for polymer blends at different environmental conditions.
Epoxy (EP) and Unsaturated polyester (UPE) resins were used to prepare
polymer blends(EP/UPE) with various weight ratios (95/5)% , (90/10)% . After
determining Shore hardness values, the specimens of both ratios of mixing were
subjected to different environments included: sunlight for times )1,2,3,4,5)
hours, the immersion into diverse types of waters (distilled, tap and rain) for the
same previous periods for comparing the two cases. Other samples were
immersed into the mentioned water kinds but for longer times (1,2,3,4) weeks.
The results showed that the shore hardness values increase of both ratios after
the subjecting to the sunlight at the above period while decease when the
specimens were immersed into the different water sorts at the same period. The
obtained results showed that the rate of dropping of hardness values was
increased clearly at longer times of the immersion (4 weeks).
Keywords: Polymer blends, Shore hardness, sunlight, immersion