The application of microwave measurements to the characterisation of rubber compounds vulcanisation is considered. The behaviour of mechanical and microwave (20 GHz) dielectric parameters during vulcanisation was investigated for rubber compounds with different concentrations of active and non-active carbon black. An increase of concentration or activity of carbon black results in the increase of both dielectric permittivity ε?(T) and loss ε?(T) and in the increase of torsion modulus as well. The start of the vulcanisation reaction is indicated by an increase of dielectric permittivity and torsion modulus in all investigated unvulcanised compounds with carbon black. While for compounds with non-active carbon black the vulcanisation can be better indicated by the ε?(T) anomaly, for compounds with active carbon black it is more clearly seen by the change of ε?(T) behaviour.
Two different approaches to investigate the local complex conductivity and the surface charge with Scanning Force Microscopy (SFM) techniques are presented. It is shown that the measurement of local electrical properties with SFM leads to interesting information about the composition of electrically heterogeneous surfaces
With an extended contact and non-contact mode scanning force microscope samples with different heterogeneous electrical properties can be characterized. The contact mode method allows the determination of local electric conductivities of heterogeneous systems at the sample surfaces. An interpretation of this behaviour can be obtained in combination with other SFM modes such as topography, friction and compliance used simultaneously. The non-contact mode SFM allows to get more information about the local surface charge of heterogeneous samples. In this paper two new SFM approaches will be discussed on examples of carbon-fibre reinforced, organic and ceramic materials