Up to now the great majority of silanes for the application in silica filled tread compounds for car tires are poly- or disulfidic silanes like bis(triethoxysilylpropyl) tetra- or disulfide. The increasing demand for cars with lower fuel consumption lead to the requirement for the tire manufacturers to reduce the rolling resistance of tires. Additionally new approaching legislational restrictions concerning the emission of volatile organic compounds during the mixing process or during tire lifetime created interest in silanes with decreased emission of ethanol. The new silane VP Si 363 combines a significant increase in tire performance by reducing rolling resistance by more than 10% with the solution for the new ecological needs by cutting the ethanol emission by 80 %. Due to its special chemical structure the application of this silane differs from the one of the standard polysulfide silanes. In this paper, important differences concerning silane and sulfur concentration, change of accelerator system or mixing process are discussed and recommendations are given. VP Si 363, which can be seen as a successor of the standard silanes like TESPT or TESPD, leads to strongly improved in-rubber data and rolling resistance as proven by a tire test. Because of its different molecular structures on the silica and polymer coupling sites, several alterations of the compound formulation are necessary to achieve the benefits of the mercapto function. Silane concentration should be increased and the sulfur adjusted to the disulfide level. The IAC should be applied which improves the processing behaviour significantly and reduces the overall amount of activators in the compound. In contrast to the polysulfidic silanes VP Si 363 is temperature stable regarding pre-scorch. In a field test no further adjustment or optimization was necessary during mixing, extrusion or tire manufacture which confirmes the lab results. Balanced tire properties were obtained and a performance jump for rolling resistance by an improvement of 13% was gained. In addition VOC emissions were reduced by 80%, which gives tire producers the possibility to do the next step towards environmental friendlier products.
Application of the new rubber silane VP Si 363 in silica filled tread compounds
Anwendung des neuen Kautschuksilans VP Si 363 in Reifen aus silicagefüllten Kautschukkomponenten
2006
11 Seiten, 8 Bilder, 5 Tabellen, 9 Quellen
Conference paper
English
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