Thermal analysis and mechanical properties of high-density polyethylene (HDPE) scraps

Abstract

High density polyethylene (HDPE) post-consumption bottles were collected and milled. After processing in a twin screw extruder, material defined as recycled HDPE (mixture of white, ivory and colorless bottles) was injection molded and mechanical properties, such as tensile strength and impact strength, were evaluated and compared with a commercial HDPE sample. Thermal analysis by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and statistical analysis of the experimental results were also carried out. Regarding tensile strength, difference between samples of recycled HDPE and commercial HDPE was so insignificant that, within the adopted experimental conditions, one might say that recycled and commercial materials are equivalent. In turn, kinetic model used in the thermal analysis showed that commercial HDPE presents process of nucleation and growth of crystals more simple and homogeneous, while activation energy is significantly higher than the other samples of HDPE.

Keywords:
high-density polyethylene; mechanical properties; thermal analysis