Project on quality improvement and quality control of the African natural rubber : Study on the variability of African natural rubber, training on the RPA 2000 and analysis of project samples
In the course of studies on the variability of African natural rubber, a series of analyses were conducted using the Rubber process Analyser (RPA 2000) manufactured by the firm Alpha Technologies. This oscillating cavity rheometer is already widely used in the rubber industry by numerous synthetic producers of synthetic elastomers as well as manufacturers to better understand and predict the behaviour of master batches or raw rubber during the mixing process as well as during the final processing. In the course of this project, we were unable to have our 36 project samples prepared, tested by a manufacturer. It was therefore thought necessary that their rheological behaviour could be analysed using an apparatus that was already widely used in the rubber industry. It was then decided, with the approval of the Alpha Technologies firm, then certain tests could be conducted in order to: 1/ evaluate the practical advantages and disadvantages of the RPA 2000 measurement apparatus, as well as its associated software. To this effect, Eugene EHABE and Serge PALU went to Brussels, in the premises of the Alpha Technologies firm, to get some training on the use of the apparatus, and to test it, 2/ analyse the entirety of the project samples. As a follow-up, we shall in this report: - Briefly describe the principle underlying the functioning of the RPA 2000, the theoretical notions having been treated in the previous report [1]; - Present a glimpse of the advantages and disadvantages of the RPA 2000 as an instrument for characterizing natural rubber at the production factories; - Present the entirety of the results obtained for the 36 project samples, following analysis using the RPA 2000, notably: - an evaluation of the repeatability of measurements obtained with the RPA 2000, - the contribution of the RPA 2000 to discriminate the four African factories tested, - relationships obtained between indicators of the RPA 2000 and the classical technological criteria, - relationships obtained between indicators of the RPA 2000 and some new physico-chemical criteria.
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | monograph biblioteca |
| Language: | eng |
| Published: |
CIRAD-CP
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| Subjects: | Q60 - Traitement des produits agricoles non alimentaires, |
| Online Access: | http://agritrop.cirad.fr/514925/ http://agritrop.cirad.fr/514925/1/ID514925.pdf |
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