OVERVIEW OF THE SILICONE RUBBER

Silicone rubber’s special features such as “Organosiloxanes Polymer” has been originated from its unique molecular structure that they carry both inorganic and organic properties unlike other organic rubbers. In other words, due to the Si-O bond of Silicone Rubber and its inorganic properties, Silicone Rubber is superior to ordinary organic rubbers in terms of heat resistance, chemical stability, electrical insulating, abrasion resistance, weatherability and ozone resistance etc...

With these unique characteristics, Silicone Rubber has been widely used to replace petrochemical products in various industries like aerospace, munitions industry, automobile, construction, electric and electronics, medical and food processing industry. Recently, these scopes of silicone application have been expanding at a great speed by the demand of industries that want more reliable elastomer.

Silicone Rubber Manufacturing Process

Silicone is being used extensively as a core material in overall aspects of a wide range of industries

• 

  Automobile industry

• 

  Medical Industry

• 

  Home products
  industry

• 

  Personal care Industry

• 

  Electric /
  Electronic Industry

• 

  Baby Products
  Industry

• 

  Aerospace Industry

History of Silicone

- In 1823, J.J.Berzelius (Swedish chemist) synthesized SiCl4 by treating silicon with chlorine. Si + 2 Cl2 → SiCl4
- In 1863, C. Friedel and J.M. Crafts synthesized Si-C bonding
- In 1899, F.S.Kipping pioneered the study of organic compounds of silicone and coined the term "Silicone"
- In 1930, J.F.Hyde, W.I Patnode started commercial research on Silicone
- The first Silicone product is DC-4 Grease and it had been more commercialized according to military demands during World War II

Chemical structure of Silicone

• 
• 
• 

The molecular structure of Silicone oil has a chain-like structure and these group of chains are formed by siloxane bond which each of molecules exists independently to allow molecular chain to move freely between each other and makes it flowable. In other words it has a liquid characteristic. The longer the molecular chain, it is more difficult to move and has higher the viscosity. Various products can be produced which have different viscosities by controlling the degree of polymerization.

Unlike ordinary organic rubber, Silicone rubber, more precisely call Organosiloxanes Polymer, has the inorganic and organic properties at the same time due to its molecular structure. Because silicones consist of inorganic silicon-oxygen backbone chain (Si-O), Silicone rubber offers good heat resistance, chemical stability, electric insulation, abrasion resistance, weatherability and ozone resistance far superior to organic rubbers in general.

Furthermore, Polydimethyl siloxane which is a basic material of silicone rubber, is a long chain high polymer which forms a helical structure and has a low mutual attraction between molecules gives excellent compression set, rebound and cold resistance. Methyl groups along the backbone in silicone gives properties such as water-repellence, releasability, workability, solubility etc. Due to these properties, silicone rubber is widely used in all industries to replace petrochemical products, including Aerospace, ammunition industry, automotive, find chemistry, electronics, construction, medical device, personal care, houseware, solar cell and semiconductor etc. Recently, the field of application is expanding more rapidly.

Business Area