Synthesis and hydrophobic properties of F & Si containing poly(ethylene terephthalate)

Abstract

In this report, a series of F & Si containing poly(ethyl terephthalate) (PET–F–Sis) were synthesized via polycondensation of terephthalic acid, ethanediol, 2,2,3,3,4,4,5,5-octafluoro-1,6-hexanediol and reactive polysiloxane. Reactants had active reactivity and low thermal degradation, and PET–F–Sis had good melting flow property with the η ranging 0.6–0.7 dL g⁻¹. In addition, the production efficiency was increased considerably by decreasing the polycondensation time from 90 minutes to lower than 30 minutes. Moreover, the air–film interfaces of PET–F–Si films were analyzed by water contact angle meter (WCA), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopic (XPS) and atomic force microscopy (AFM). The results indicated that segments containing fluorine and silicon migrated to the surface and fabricated the rough morphology with tiny sharp bulges. And this contributed to the substantial improvement of hydrophobic property of the surfaces with the evidence of the static water contact angle increasing from 76.56° for PET to 134.77° for PET–F–Si10. The progress revealed potential productions of hydrophobic PET materials in future applications.