Investigation of crosslinking behaviour of silane grafted polyethylene through rheology

In this work the crosslinking behaviour of two silane-grafted polyethylenes was investigated with respect to time and temperature by using dynamic rheological measurements. It has been found that inhomogeneous character of the crosslinking reaction takes place in both tested samples. By utilization of G′-G" crossover method, it has been found that the sample with initially distinct crosslinking state and short critical crosslinking reaction time has high tendency to create small gels during production of hot water pipes. It has also been revealed that the temperature dependence of the critical time, at which the crosslinking speed is the highest, shows an Arrhenius-type behaviour.