Summary: Both plasticized (semi-rigid and flexible) PVC materials as well as PVC in solutions, the rate of their thermal degradation and effective stabilization are caused by essentially different fundamental phenomena in comparison to aging of PVC in absence of the solvent. Both structure and macromolecular dynamics render the significant influence on its stability, i.e. chemical nature of the solvent (plasticizer), its basicity, specific and non-specific solvation, degree of PVC in a solution (solubility), segmental mobility of macromolecules, thermodynamic properties of the solvent (plasticizer), formation of associates, aggregates, etc. The chemical stabilization of PVC plays a less significant role. The effect of above factors on stability (behavior) of semi-rigid and flexible PVC will be done on quantitative level. It will be described effect of ''echo''-type of stabilization on the stability of PVC in the presence of plasticizers. If we would like to have stable material from PVC we should make stabilization of plasticizers as more reactive chemical compounds.Keywords: aggregates; associates; basicity; plasticizers; segmental mobility of macromolecules; solubility; solution; solvent; specific and non-specific solvation; thermodynamic properties
Effect of SolventAt PVC's degradation in solution, one of the basic reasons of change of the process kinetic parameters is the nucleophilic activation of a PVC's dehydrochlorination reaction. The process is described by E 2 mechanism.[1-3] Thus, there is a linear dependence between PVC's thermal dehydrochlorination rate and parameter of solvent's relative basicity B cm À1 (Fig. 1). [1][2][3] (The value B cm À1 is evaluated by shift of a characteristic band OH of phenol at l ¼ 3600 cm À1 in an IR-spectrum at interaction with the solvent [4] ). It is essentially important that the rate of PVC's dehydrochlorination in the solvents with relative basicity B > 50 cm À1 was always above, than the rate of PVC's dehydrochlorination without the solvent, while when B < 50 cm À1 , PVC's desintegration rate was always less, than at it's destruction without the solvent. The revealed dependence V HCl ¼ f (B) is described by the equation:An inhibition of PVC's disintegration in the solvents with basicity B < 50 cm À1 is very interesting and practically important phenomenon. It has received the name ''solvatational'' stabilization of PVC. Let's notice, however, that ignoring of the fact that PVC solutions even at low concentration (2 wt. %) do not represent solutions with isolated macromolecules but rather with structured systems, results that in a number of cases a deviation from linear dependence of PVC dehydrochlorination rate of the solvent basicity B cm À1 is observed. In particular, an abnormal behavior of PVC is observed at destruction in certain ester-type solvents (plasticizers) (Fig. 1, points 25-28), that apparently caused by structural changes of macromo-