Viscoelastic and adhesive properties of PMMA-b-PtBA with tackifier

Abstract The study of adhesive behavior of poly(methyl methacrylate)-b-poly(t-butyl acrylate) (PMMA-b-PtBA) diblock copolymers is rare in literature. In this study, we prepared a PMMA-b-PtBA diblock copolymer (B-16) by the anionic polymerization technique and compounded it with various amounts of tackifier (Staybelite Ester 3 synthetic resin of Hercules Inc., a triethylene glycol ester of partially hydrogenated wood rosin). The B-16 contained 10 parts of tackifier per hundred parts of polymer (phr), which has a better storage modulus ( G ') at 120 °C and 0.1 rad/s than counterpart homopolymer PMMAs of different average molecular weights, containing the same phr of tackifier. Increasing the molecular weight of homopolymer PMMA samples (containing 10 phr of tackifier), the G ' value at 120 °C increases toward the optimum region. The peel performance relates rather well to the viscoelastic property.