Assessing Polymer Ageing FTIR

Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) is the most reliable and cost-effective method to identify the main components of a plastic material.  One of the strongest capabilities of the FTIR is the identification of degradation-oxidation within the plastic and can, therefore, be used in assessing polymer ageing FTIR.

Plastics are susceptible to thermal oxidation and degradation rendering them brittle and affecting their colour.  Oxidation could be caused due to poor mixing of additives, bad processing and extensive thermal or sun-UV exposure.  Oxidation would result in the formation of carbonyls altering the molecular structure of the material. This will yield extra bands in the relevant FTIR polymer spectrum.

Impact Solutions are equipped with a Thermo Nicolet is10, FTIR coupler with an ATR attachment.  We can offer material analysis and identification results in a few seconds. In addition, Impact Solutions owns a large library of reference FTIR polymer spectra and can perform material comparisons in hundreds of polymer compounds.