ADHESION OF POLYPROPYLENE TREATED WITH NITRIC AND SULFURIC-ACID

The surface treatment of polyolefins to improve its adhesion capacity remains as an important field of research and several techniques are d escribed in the literature. In this work, we are interested in the dev elopment of a method to obtain adherent polypropylene. In this way, we investigate the effect of nitric and sulfuric acid treatments onto po lymer plates under various experimental conditions and measure the adh esive strength of the samples joined with leather using commercial pol ychloroprene. The experiments follow a factorial design and the result s show an increase in the adhesivity of the material in comparison wit h untreated samples. The IR spectra of nitric acid treated samples cha nge in relation to the original material, whereas sulfuric acid treatm ent does not affect the IR spectra. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.