In situ simultaneous measurement of stress, retardation, and three-dimensional refractive indexes during biaxial stretching experiments under various preheating times

An evaluation method for the stretchability of a biaxially oriented film during the stretching process was recently developed using an in situ measurement test machine. Stress, retardation, three-dimensional refractive indexes, light-scattering image, and birefringence distribution of films could be obtained in a short time. This stretching test machine was applied to examine the film stretchability of both semicrystalline polymers, such as polypropylene, and noncrystalline polymers, such as polystyrene, under various preheating times. From the measurements, the stress of semicrystalline polymers increased with increasing preheating times before stretching the film. However, the stress of noncrystalline polymers did not increase with increasing preheating times. This means that semicrystalline polymer is required to set up an optimum stretching condition of the preheating time for a satisfactory biaxially oriented film. Furthermore, the birefringence distribution and thickness uniformity of the stretched film were measured simultaneously. It was found that the stretchability of polypropylene and polystyrene films could be evaluated with a small piece of the sample using the biaxial stretching test machine.

Development of a biaxial stretching test machine and its applications

The evaluation method for a biaxially oriented film was developed using in-situ measurement during the stretching process. It can obtain basic data such as stress-strain curves, birefringence, light scattering, three dimensional refractive indexes and birefringence distribution. Stress and strain as functions of stretching speed and stretching temperature, as well as the deformation of spherulite of semi-crystalline polymer can be obtained by measuring the birefringence and light scattering during the biaxial stretching process with a small piece of polymer sample. The experimental results show the stress, retardation and three dimensional molecular orientations behavior during the simultaneous biaxial stretching and the sequential biaxial stretching process. Stretchability, thickness uniformity and spherulite size can be obtained simultaneously. In this paper, advantages and details of the newly developed system will be discussed with some experimental data.

Bi-axially Oriented Blown Film Technology

A set of commercial polyethylenes (three LDPE and three LLDPE) was rheological characterized and processed in a laboratory double bubble extrusion line with the purpose of investigating: i) whether their relative processability could be predicted in the laboratory and ii) the effect of operating and machine variables on processability. Oscillatory shear and extensional measurements were able to differentiate the various materials, who also behaved quite differently upon processing. Those with a stronger shear thinning behaviour, higher elasticity and higher melt strength were the most suited to the process. Bubble stability and thickness uniformity were assumed as the main requirements for processability. The former was estimated by monitoring the time required to stabilize the bubble and examining any variation/oscillation in size/shape. Bubble stability depends on the interaction between various parameters, the most relevant being those related with the film cooling stage, namely the axial position of the air rings, the air flow rate and air velocity. The study was preceded by an assessment of the performance of the re-heating oven and die/calibration/centring, as these parameters could also narrow the practical operating window.

Physical properties of biaxially oriented PA6 film for simultaneous stretching and sequential processing

There are two different stretching processes that produce the biaxially oriented film, namely the tenter process and double bubble tubular film process. Furthermore, there are two tenter processes, i.e., the sequential biaxial stretching process and simultaneous biaxial stretching process. There is no report describing the difference among film physical properties of the three different processes. The biaxially oriented polyamide film using the double bubble tubular process has good balanced physical property and high impact strength, thus it is used for proper applications utilizing their advantage properties. In this report, the influence of each biaxial stretching process on film physical properties of polyamide, which has hydrogen bond, was studied in detail. As a result, the tentering process film has anisotropic tensile properties between machine direction (MD) and transverse direction (TD). This result was influenced by a later stretching process, namely TD stretching. On the contrary, the double bubble tubular film has good balanced properties, especially thermal shrinkage and impact strength. Tentering simultaneous stretching film has much larger shrinkage in MD than in TD. The sequential stretching film has larger shrinkage in TD than in MD. The double bubble tubular film has high impact strength, because it corresponds to the balanced molecular orientation.