Thermal oxidation of Poly(dicyclopentadiene)– kinetic modeling of double bond consumption

This paper reports chemical changes that occur in polydicyclopentadiene during thermal oxidation at several temperatures and oxygen pressures. A particular attention was paid to the double bond consumption since these latter are associated with crosslinking and subsequent changes in mechanical properties. A kinetic model was derived from the experimental results. Its rate constants were assessed from the “inverse approach” based on their selective identification under specific ageing conditions (for example under oxygen excess). The resulting model satisfactorily describes both carbonyl formation and double bond consumption for a wide range of temperature and oxygen pressure for the first time. This can be exploited to predict the changes of local mechanical properties.