Rubber and Plastics Failure Analysis: Physical and Chemical Analysis Techniques

Course description
Time: 10:00 AM - 3:00 PM
Location: 240 South Forge Street, Akron, Ohio 44325
Classroom 217 (Located inside the National Polymer Innovation Center)
Cost: $700.00 USD
CEU's: 0.8
Instructor: Mr. David Russell

Course Overview

The course is intended for chemical technologists, engineers, and quality personnel who, in the course of their work, encounter non-conformances related to rubber and plastic materials or rubber and plastic end products. The course begins with a series of case studies involving failures of rubber and plastic products the instructor has encountered. The discussion includes physical and chemical techniques, the rationale for the techniques selected, and the ultimate outcomes. The cases studies include ozone failures in elastomers, stress cracking and impact failures in plastics, fatigue failures, chemical degradation, errors in materials used, and more. Next, ASTM and related testing methods are reviewed including tensile tensile testing, abrasion testing, compression set and stress relaxation tests, impact tests, and the like. Predictive methods such as Arrhenius and SN methods are discussed. Analytical and instrumental methods covered includes: polymer identification by simple wet chemistry methods as well as more advanced methods such as FT-IR, NMR, state of cure analysis, microbeam analysis methods, and chromatographic methods. Finally, a series of additional case studies related to a broad range of actual failure analyses including tires, cast polyurethane parts, medical devices, automotive parts, hose and tubing, sporting goods, and the like.

Who Should Attend: Materials and quality technicians and junior level chemists looking to expand their knowledge and skill set related to testing and analysis. Product engineers, managers, quality professionals desiring to expand their knowledge of what tests or analyses to request and/or desiring better understanding of the significance and interpretation of laboratory results. Pre-requisites; general technical aptitude and general familiarity of technical terminology related to rubber and plastic materials.

  1. Introduction
  2. Case Studies: 15 Case Studies related to industrial, tire, medical plastics, sporting goods made from NR, SBR, NBR, PU, PC, HDPE, and or ABS.
  3. ASTM Test Methods: Tensile, Tear, Compressive, Abrasion, Impact, Stress Cracking, MFI, Capillary Rheology, and the like.
  4. Predictive Testing
    • Arrhenius Aging Life Predictions
    • SN Fatigue
    • Creep Rupture
  5. Analytical and Instrumental Techniques
    • Polymer ID by Wet Methods, FTIR, NMR
    • Chromatographic Methods: GPC, HPLC, GC
    • DMA, TGA and DSC Thermal Methods
    • Microbeam Analysis
  6. Standard Analytical Packages
  7. Additional Case Studies

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