STRUCTURE AND PHYSICAL-PROPERTIES OF BIAXIALLY STRETCHED POLYETHYLENE TEREPHTHALATE SHEET AFTER HEAT-SETTING

The consumption of hot-fillable poly(ethylene terephthalate) bottles is extremely large and is still increasing in Japan. This type of bottle is generally manufactured by the heat-set method using hot molds after stretch-blow molding. In this study, the method is simulated using a setting application in which sheets can be stretched constraining their sizes on a hot aluminum block. The crystallinities of the sheets are found to depend on the thermal history, i.e., the duration and temperature of the heat-set cycle. Heat-setting mitigates thermal-shrinkage of the sheets which is due to the increase in crystallinity or in the tense segments in the amorphous region. The structure of the heat-set sheet varies depending on the original stretched sheet. For a sample of low draw ratio, the crystallinity does not increase because of the heat-set. For a sample of medium draw ratio, the crystallinity increases greatly and the tense segments in the amorphous region also increase because of heat-set. For a sample of high draw ratio, the crystallinity increases a little but the numbers of the crystallite and tense segments in the amorphous region do not change with the heat-set.