Conductivity of crosslinked low surface energy epoxy coatings

A new and straightforward method has been studied to prepare crosslinkedlow surface energy semiconductive epoxy coatings. The low surface energy isobtained by adding a small amount of partially fluorinated bifunctional primaryamine Jeffamine D230 crosslinker and the conductivity is achieved by adding a smallamount of semiconductive nanosized Cobalt(III) phthalocyanine particles. The use ofpartially fluorinated crosslinker strongly influences the conductivity, the conductiveparticle network structure, and the network distribution in the coatings. Comparedto coatings that are free of fluorine, variations in fractal dimension, percolationthreshold, particle-containing layer thickness, and conductivity level are observed asthe amount of fluorinated species is varied. These differences can be explained by(local) differences in effective Hamaker constant, viscosity, curing rate, evaporationof the solvent, and presence or absence of polymer matrix between the particles inthe network. Our results suggest that other crosslinked semiconductive low surfaceenergy epoxy coatings can be realized in a similar manner, but careful optimizationof processing conditions is required to obtain the desired conductivity levels at lowfiller concentration. VVC 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Chem 47: 366380, 2009