Abstract
It is well known that poly(cyclohexylene dimethylene terephthalate) (PCT) is used as the engineering plastics with high melting temperature and fast crystallization rate compared with poly(butylene terephthalate)(PBT). However, poor thermal stability of PCT has limited its practical application due to the drastic decrease of molecular weight during the processing temperature. In order to improve the thermal stability of PCT homopolymer, the copolymer of PCT and PBT was synthesized and the thermal properties of the copolymer have been studied. P(CT/BT) copolymer was obtained by condensation polymerization of DMT, CHDM, and 1,4-butanediol. The chemical structure and composition of the copolymer was investigated by FTIR and NMR analysis. The thermal behavior of copolymer was studied using DSC and it was found that the crystallization-melting behavior of the copolymer was observed for the whole composition range. TGA analysis exhibited that P(CT/BT) copolymer is more stable at the initial stage of thermal decomposition compared with PCT and PBT homopolymers.