Time-resolved FTIR study of crystallization behavior of melt-crystallized poly(phenylene sulfide)

The crystallization behavior of melt-crystallized poly(phenylene sulfide) ( PPS) was studied using time-resolved Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spec troscopy measurements. The 1073-cm(-1) amorphous band was chosen for charac terizing the crystallization feature of PPS. The melt-crystallization kinet ics suggested three-dimensional crystal growth for the primary crystallizat ion and one-dimensional crystal growth for the secondary crystallization in the case of low supercooling, while a deviation from these occurred with i ncreasing supercooling. The time-resolved FTIR measurement was highly corre lated with differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) measurements and further exhibited some fine details concerned with the microstructural feature of PPS, such as heterogeneity of the amorphous phase not only above T-g, but a lso below T-g. A novel method was suggested to calculate the rigid amorphou s fraction in terms of the increase in slope of the absorbance variation wi th temperature at T-g. These calculated results were also found to be corre lated to those obtained by DSC.