A new type of thermally reversible covalent crosslinker was applied to chlorinated polyethylene(CPE) in order to get a thermally reversible covalent crosslinked CPE and a crosslinked product with 81.79% gel content was obtained by means of solution reaction.The effects of CPE grades
catalysts and their dosage
reaction temperature and time and the dosage of crosslinker on the gel content were studied.It was proved by IR that the gel was generated through esterification between the chlorine on carbon of CPE and the carboxylic salt groups of the crosslinker.The gel content increases with the extension of reaction time and enhancement of temperature and also increases with the increased dosage of crosslinker.It Was found that no gel was generated if the phase transfer catalyst was not applied to the reaction system.The crosslinked CPE exhibited thermally reversible behavior due to the dimer/monomer(cyclopentadiene) conversion of-DCPD-moieties via reversible Diels-Alder cycloaddition.