Damping Behavior of the Phenolic Based Composite Friction Materials Containing Thermoplastic Elastomers (TPEs)

Attempts have been made for the first time to produce a friction material with thermal sensitive modulus by the inclusion of combined plastic/rubber properties of thermoplastic elastomers (TPE) as viscoelastic polymeric materials into the formulation for the purpose of increasing the damping behavior. In order to evaluate the viscoelastic parameters such as loss factor (tan δ) and elastic modulus (E’) for the friction material, dynamic mechanical analyzer (DMA) was used. Styrene-butadiene-styrene (SBS), styrene-ethylene-butylene-styrene (SEBS) and nitrile rubber/polyvinyl chloride (NBR/PVC) blend systems were used as TPE materials. However, NBR/PVC and SEBS were found to be more effective in damping behavior. All the friction materials containing TPEs exhibited more damping behavior at a wide range of temperature compared with the reference sample.