Mate­r­i­al selec­tion in rub­ber production — 
Which com­po­nents are decisive? 

The basic com­po­nent of every rub­ber com­pound is the poly­mer, the rub­ber, which deter­mines basic prop­er­ties such as tem­per­a­ture behav­ior, chem­i­cal resis­tance or elasticity. 

When putting togeth­er a rub­ber com­pound, the man­u­fac­tur­er has a vari­ety of syn­thet­ic rub­bers at his dis­pos­al in addi­tion to nat­ur­al rub­ber, each of which has spe­cif­ic prop­er­ties. Some rub­bers, for exam­ple, offer excel­lent oil resis­tance, oth­ers impress with out­stand­ing mechan­i­cal prop­er­ties, and still oth­ers with very high age­ing resis­tance. For most appli­ca­tions, there is a suit­able rub­ber that offers the desired properties. 

Besides rub­ber, fillers (e.g. car­bon black, sili­cic acid or chalk) make up the largest pro­por­tion of a rub­ber com­pound. Among oth­er things, they influ­ence the hard­ness, strength, abra­sion and elec­tri­cal con­duc­tiv­i­ty of the vul­can­ized rub­ber. Plas­ti­ciz­ers also influ­ence the hard­ness and work­a­bil­i­ty of the com­pound, but also the stretch­a­bil­i­ty. Although the cross-link­ing sys­tem makes up only a small part of the rub­ber com­pound, it has a great influ­ence on its prop­er­ties. It pri­mar­i­ly con­trols the speed of vul­can­iza­tion, but also influ­ences oth­er char­ac­ter­is­tics such as tear resis­tance. Pro­cess­ing aids influ­ence the han­dling of the rub­ber com­pound dur­ing the pro­duc­tion process. These include, for exam­ple, tack­i­ness and flow behav­ior, i.e. how eas­i­ly the com­pound can be pressed into a mold. In addi­tion, there are a large num­ber of oth­er addi­tives that influ­ence, among oth­er things, the col­or, the extru­date sta­bil­i­ty, the age­ing behav­ior and the elec­tri­cal con­duc­tiv­i­ty of the rub­ber compound.