Study of the mechanical properties of recycled abs and recovery throught mixing with SEBS

Abstract

Recovery of recycled acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) through mixing with styrene-ethylene/butylene- styrene (SEBS) has been studied in this paper. To simulate recycled ABS, virgin ABS was processed through 5 cycles, at extreme processing temperatures, 220 oC and 260 oC. The virgin ABS, the virgin SEBS, the recycled ABS and the mixtures were mechanically characterized after the various cycles of reprocessing in order to evaluate their corresponding properties and correlate them with the number of cycles undergone. The results show that tensile strength of ABS remains practically constant as the number of reprocessing cycles increases, while in the material injected with SEBS the tensile strength decreases. Concerning the Charpy notched impact strength; the values of the ABS reprocessed at 220 oC remain more or less unchanged, while the values for 260 oC show a significant decrease. The adhesion of the SEBS causes, in both cases, an increase in impact strength.