Effect of solid particle loading on nucleophilic addition of epoxy-resin to isophorone diisocyanate

In the preparation of surface coatings made of conductive composites consisting of conductive particulate fillers in a soft matrix, cracks will develop with increase of the particulate loading, which is believed to be related to the nucleophilic addition reaction between glycidyl end-capped poly (bisphenol A-co-epichlorohydrin) and isophorone diisocyanate molecules. This curing reaction is responsible for the generation of cross-linking network throughout the coatings. The influence of solid particle loading on the chemical reaction may be described as a volume-excluded effect, that is, the high solid particle loading will occupy the space between the functional groups thus preventing the chemical reaction to take place. As a direct consequence, the cross-linking network cannot develop properly due to the insufficiency of curing reaction. This will lead to the generation of cracks, as was supported by FT-IR analysis in this work.