Effect of propylene comonomer on the modulus of oriented ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene

The effect of propylene (I) comonomer content on the room-temp. Young's modulus of soln.-spun/drawn ultrahigh-mol.-wt. (UHMW) polyethylene-I copolymer (II) was studied in the range of comonomer concn. 0.05-1.35 mol %. The stiffness decreased with increasing content of I comonomer. A simple model is presented which quant. describes the modulus of highly drawn UHMW II (for l > 30) as a function of I concn. At l > 30, to a good approxn., each Me side group produced 1 effective structural defect. [on SciFinder (R)