The effect of ceria nanoparticles on improving heat resistant properties of fluorosilicone rubber

ABSTRACT The thermal aging behavior of poly(3,3,3‐trifluoropropyl)methylsiloxane was investigated by thermal gravimetric analysis and isothermal aging tests, and the results indicated the degradation mechanism II, oxidation scission of the side groups, played a more important role when the temperature was below 350 °C. The addition of ceria had significantly improved the thermal stability of fluorosilicone rubber (FSR) by inhibiting the oxidation scission. Moreover, two types of ceria including laminar‐structure ceria (LS‐CeO 2 ) and nanoparticle ceria (N‐CeO 2 ) were prepared and surface was modified by KH570 and characterized by scanning electron microscopy, transmission electron microscope, and X‐ray diffractometer. FSR incorporated with modified LS‐CeO 2 and N‐CeO 2 revealed a significant improvement on the heat resistant properties. In particular, after having been thermal oxidative aged for 70 h at 250 °C, FSR containing 2 wt % of modified N‐CeO 2 maintained 72.6% of tensile strength and 63.9% of elongation at break, respectively, while FSR without ceria completely failed. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2016 , 133 , 44117.