Orientation Processes in Crystalline and Amorphous Regions of Polypropylene During Yarn Spinning

Abstract

The influence of the spinneret draw ratio and subsequent solid-state stretching of polypropylene multifilament yarns (PMY) on changes in the orientation of crystallites and molecular chains in the polymer amorphous regions was studied using x-ray structure analysis. It was shown that crystallites and molecular chains of amorphous polypropylene (PP) became significantly more oriented already for a yarn spinneret draw ratio of 2400% and changed little if it was increased further. Additional solid-state stretching of yarns at elevated temperature had practically no effect on the orientation of PP crystallites but did halve the misorientation angle of molecular chains in the polymer amorphous regions. This phenomenon suggested that the substantial decrease of the elongation at break and increase of PMY physicomechanical parameters could be attributed to distribution of the applied load onto a larger number of continuous chains.