A Study on the Effect of Porous CaCO ₃ on Micro-Cellular Plastics as an Additive for Nucleation

Plastics are widely used in industry, in that they are light and easily manufactured. Much research is being conducted currently to increase the strengths and to reduce the price of the material. Foaming techniques are used to achieve insulation properties, to reduce weight, and to reduce the material cost. Due to their unique properties, foamed plastics are applied to refrigerator, pipe, and insulators. In 1980, Micro-cellular foaming was invented at MIT. By applying the outstanding foaming technique, many small cells are generated in the polymer matrices and micro-cellular foamed plastics show relatively high specific strength. We investigated the role of CaCO ₃ , which is one of the most widely used additives in the plastics industry, for nucleation in view of cell morphology. Porous CaCO ₃ chemically treated to increase the dispersibility and to lower the density was used in this study. Two experiments were conducted in order to check the role of the additive for nucleation. One is the compound-ability test and the other is for the role as nucleation agents.