Copper Coordinated Segmented Polyurethanes and Their Electrophysical Properties

Abstract The effect of coordination interactions on the electrophysical properties of segmented polyurethanes (SPU) is studied. For the coordination binding of SPU, the products of CuCl 2 and N,N' ‐diethylhydroxylamine (DEHA) interaction were used. The lowest values of the bulk electrical resistivity ( ρ v ) for metal‐coordinated segmented polyurethanes (MSPU) modified by the CuCl 2 –DEHA system are achieved already at a very low of CuCl 2 content, which is in the range of 0.1–0.5 wt %. The change in ρ v is abrupt, and the ρ v values themselves increase by 1000–5000 times. The obtained results are of great practical importance since they allow to achieve the ability of such polyurethanes to effectively remove static electricity from their surface. The coordination binding with the use of low CuCl 2 –DEHA content leads to an increase in the temperature of transition into the viscous flow state from 160 °C for unmodified SPU to 185 °C for MSPU containing 0.1 wt % of CuCl 2 introduced in the CuCl 2 –DEHA system. It is suggested that macromolecules are attracted due to dipole‐dipole interactions to the corresponding charge of metal complexes. The interactions as a result of the cooperative effect lead to the orientation and self‐organization of macromolecules relative to each other.