2. Experimental
2.1. Materials
High ammonia NR latex with 60% total solid content was purchased from Zarm Scientific and Supplies (Malaysia) Sdn Bhd. Sago starch was manufactured by Sago Link Sdn Bhd. Potassium hydroxide by Merck Sdn Bhd. Anchoid, antioxidant, zinc oxide (ZnO), zinc diethyldithiocarbamate (ZDEC) and sulphur dispersions were supplied by HH Saintifik Enterprise Sdn Bhd and were used as received.
2.2. Sago starch dispersion preparation
Sago starch dispersion was prepared by using the formulation as shown in Table 1. The preparation of initial coarse slurry was done by mixing the aqueous solutions of dispersing agent and stabilizer with water first followed by addition of sago starch under speed stirring at 250 rpm for 20 minutes at room temperature. The resulting slurry of sago starch dispersion was then prepared by two dispersion methods according to Jiang et al.18 with slightly