Study of poly(organosiloxane) network formation by analysis of viscoelastic characteristics

The process of crosslinked polymer formation was studied for the case of anionic copolymerization of spirocyclosiloxane with α, ω-oligodimethylsiloxane by the methods of small-amplitude periodic deformation, sol-gel analysis and swelling. The effect of initial content of initiator and spirocyclosiloxane on the time dependences of dynamic modulus and gel-fraction was demonstrated. The structural parameters of the networks were determined The mean length of the elastically active chain in the network considerably exceeds the chain length of the initial α, ω-oligodimethylsiloxane. Increased spirocyclosiloxane content affects the viscoelastic characteristics of the network.