Development of a transparent flame retardant thermoplastic elastomer.

摘要

This thesis is a product development project of a new office chair. The specific aim of this project is developing a transparent and flame retardant thermoplastic elastomer (TPE). An elongation of 10% at 200lbs is desired for the chair seat, with complete recovery on removal of the load. Three resins were short-listed and the final resin was selected using flow simulations with different combinations of gate locations and process parameters. The product is required to have good flammability properties. To achieve this, the selected TPE was blended with flame retardants in varying proportions. The opaque blends were discarded and the transparent specimens were tested in accordance with D3801 - Standard test method for measuring the comparative burning characteristics of solid plastics in a vertical position. The material selected after all the experiments is Pellethane® 2103-70A Polyurethane Thermoplastic Elastomer, with a 10% FR-522 flame retardant.