Abstract – The preparation of natural rubber powder for improvement in fertilizers or using as addition
in polymer industries was studied. The used natural rubber was the pre-vulcanized type of latex at 60
wt%. From inherit properties of rubber that it stick together, therefore it was difficult to directly spray
dried out the latex. In this study, the water soluble modified starch of maltodextrin with DE17
was used to
encapsulated the
latex particle which the free flowing of rubber powder could be prepared. The
appropriate conditions of the spray drying to prepare the non-agglomerated rubber powder were
investigated. The morphology, size and size distribution of rubber particle was observed by using SEM
and laser light scattering technique, respectively. The inlet air temperature of 120 C was found to be the
suitable to make the rubber powder. The mass ratio of rubber to maltodextrin should not be higher than
9:1 to obtain the free flowing rubber powder