Preparation and Study of Low Percolation Threshold Antistatic Reticulated Polyurethane Foam

Reticulated polyurethane foam (PUF), a widely utilized polymer-based insulator, is notoriously susceptible to electrostatic issues, posing significant challenges in various applications. Carbon black (CB) as a conductive filler in PUF is easily agglomerated and is difficult to disperse. This can result in the high addition of CB and affects the performance of the PUF. In this work, antistatic reticulated PUFs (PUF-CB) with a low percolation threshold (0.84 wt %) were prepared using conductive CB as an antistatic agent. Creative work has been carried out to disperse CB particles using a ball milling process and the dispersant diisononyl phthalate, which has reduced the agglomeration and greatly improved the dispersion of CB particles. The volume resistivity test results showed that PUF-CB had the lowest volume resistivity of 3.59 × 10 5 Ω·m when the addition of CB was 1.40 wt %. The distribution of CB in polyether polyols and foams was analyzed using optical microscopy and SEM. The distribution of CB particle size was counted using nanoparticle size and a Zeta potential analyzer. The CB dispersion mechanism was innovatively proposed to explain the successful preparation of low percolation threshold PUFs.