Studies on suspension copolymerization rate of vinyl chloride and N-phenyl maleimide

The effects of monomer ratio, temperature and initiator concentration on the copolymerization rate of vinyl chloride(VC)/N-phenyl maleimide(PMI) were studied. The cross termination phi and the reciprocal of the comprehensive rate delta(2) were measured to be 5.77 and 53.65, respectively. The results showed that the copolymer composition of VC/PMI will largely change with the conversion. The activation energy of VC/PMI copolymerization and the propagation reaction are 127.9 kJ/mol and 63.7 kJ/mol, respectively. The order of initiator is 0.786. The reaction rates between VC/PMI and VC/N-cyclohexyl maleimide (CHMI) are compared, and the later is more rapid than the former.