摘要 |
Liquid hydrocarbons are gelled by polyethylene block copolymers (PEBC's) to yield storage stable gels and sols that contain no metal-containing gelling agents and which compositions are thermally reversible; i.e., they melt into homogeneous liquids upon heating and upon cooling resume their previous state as a gel or sol. The PEBC gelling agents are block copolymers consisting of quasi-polyethylene crystalline "hard" blocks A and amorphous hydrocarbon "soft" blocks B. Crystallinity of the blocks A imparts the gel or sol with a sharp melting point which is dependent upon the PEBC chemical composition and concentration within the hydrocarbon. The gels and sols may contain suspended solid particles, such as powdered metals, fillers or oxidizers and are pumpable even when these suspended particles are present.
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