Experimental study of polymerization and crystallization kinetics of polyamide 6 obtained by anionic ring opening polymerization of ε-caprolactam

To adapt liquid reactive processes to thermoplastic composite manufacturing, synthesis kinetics of PA6 from epsilon-caprolactam monomer have been investigated. This reaction involves simultaneously polymerization of monomers and crystallization of growing chains. It has been studied by DSC over a wide range of isothermal and non-isothermal conditions, and TGA, DSC and WAXS experiments were performed on polymerized samples. Shape of DSC curves allowed to identify the degree of interaction between polymerization and crystallization. At high temperature or high heating rate, polymerization occurs first and crystallization is delayed because of the low supercooling. When phenomena are fully decoupled, the final properties are close to conventional PA6. For lower conditions, crystallization depends on the availability of chains and polymerization controls the synthesis time. The high mobility of the environment favors the final degree of conversion and the properties of the crystalline phase. At very low temperature, a two-step crystallization is observed, due to a critical molecular weight that is required for nucleation and the degree of conversion could be affected by entrapment of reactive species in crystals. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.