The synthesis and structure of vinylidene chloride-vinyl propionate copolymers☆

PMR, X-ray structural analysis and thermography have been used to study the micro structure of the chain, the crystallinity and the transition temperatures of the vinylidene chloride-vinyl propionate copolymers (VCD-VPCP) over a wide composition range. The comparison of the experimental with the theoretical micro structure of the chain has shown the first order Markov model to be suitable for describing the mechanism of the copolymerization of these monomers having the constants r1(VDC) = 5·0±0·3 and r2 = 0·09±0·1 (20°C). The shortest crystallizing segment has been found to consist of 8 VDC chain units. The glass temperature of the copolymers has been found to be an extermal function of composition.