Rubber Heat Treatment Validation

Zhermack Elite Double 32, a formulation of vinyl polysiloxane (VPS), is a commonly used material for its high accuracy and elastomeric properties. However, the material stiffness increases significantly past the advertised setting time which can change the properties of structures made of the material. To avoid this, one solution is to wait approximately 15 days before testing - a significant bottleneck for iterations.

I tested the effect of heating the VPS to decrease the amount of time before the stiffness of the material is stabilized. To do this, I created dog-bones with different heat treatments. The stiffness of each sample was tested daily and compared to the samples initial stiffness.