Abstract
Measurements of Young's modulus, dielectric loss and a.c. conductivity have been carried out on EPDM rubber samples loaded with different concentrations of $CrCl_3$ (0,2,4 and 6 phr). The values of Young's modulus was found to be linearly dependent on the $CrCl_3$ content. Variation of the dielectric loss with temperature showed that $CrCl_3$ may act as plasticizer. However, at higher frequencies the dielectric loss was found to be independent of frequency and the rubber samples may behave as non-polar dielectric. Investigations of the a.c conductivity suggested that the conduction in these rubber samples can be described by small polaron tunneling. In addition, conductivity was found to increase with $CrCl_3$ content.