Neat high-temperature vulcanized silicone rubber (HTV SR) showed bad hydrophobicity due to the existence of a large number of inorganic reinforcing fillers on its surface, which affected its security application in outdoor insulation systems. In this work, hydrophobic silane chains were grafted onto the surface of inorganic particles on the skin layer of HTV SR by a one-step coupling modification to improve its hydrophobicity. The effects of coupling agent types and coupling reaction conditions on the hydrophobicity of HTV SR were investigated. It was determined that the perfluorooctane trichlorosilicon with a large number of low surface energy fluorine atoms was the preferred coupling agent. The contact angle of HTV SR was increased by 15.70% when the optimal coupling reaction conditions were determined to be a reaction temperature of 60°C, a reaction time of 4 h, and an amount of coupling agent of 0.5%. The study found that both etching reaction and grafting reaction occurred during the whole coupling modification process, which led to the disappearance or decrease of a lot of holes on the HTV SR surface. After the fluorination coupling reaction, the surface of HTV SR became smooth and dense that led to the decrease of water absorption. The result of Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy analysis showed the formation of C-F bond in HTV SR after fluorination modification, and the energetic dispersive spectroscopy analysis showed that the fluorine content on the surface of the fluorinated HTV SR increased significantly. Moreover, the stability analysis showed that the fluorinated HTV SR still had a good thermal stability and mechanical property stability.
Bin Gou,Congzhen Xie,Huasong Xu,Yan Du,Rui Wang,Licheng Li,Weinan Fan
High temperature vulcanized (HTV) silicone rubber (SIR), as the sheath of composite insulators, is widely used as the insulation device in transmission lines due to their excellent hydrophobicity and pollution flashover resistance. However, the interfacial defects of insulators and severe operating environment will accelerate the aging of HTV SIR sheath, seriously affecting the operation reliability of electrical equipment. Herein, the samples designed with different sizes of interfacial defects are aged under water, sulfuric acid and nitric acid at 80 °C, respectively. The results show that a large number of cracks appear on the surface of HTV SIR samples with interfacial defects after nitric acid treatment at 80 °C for more than 2 days, while samples with no interfacial defects aged under same condition for 8 days maintain unchanged. According to the results of the micro morphology of the sample, the crack is caused by the interfacial stress of the sample. In addition, after nitric acid treatment, the thermal stability, tensile and dielectric properties of HTV SIR with interfacial defects decreased significantly. The initial decomposition temperature decreases by about 30 °C, while the residual weight increases by about 2.5%. Meanwhile, the tensile strength and fracture strain decrease from 4.58 MPa and 470% to 2.07 MPa and 130% respectively, proving that cracks caused by interfacial defects can critically avianize the mechanical properties and thermal stability of HTV SIR. Also, there is an extra dielectric loss peak appearing in the frequency range of 10 2 –10 4 Hz, which attributed to water invading and the MWS polarization at cracks. By aging HTV SIR with artificial interfacial defects under thermal and acid stress, the HTV SIR cracking phenomenon of composite insulators under severe operating environment is successfully simulated. This work can provide theoretical support ulteriorly for studying the cracking mechanism and the corresponding aging characteristics of HTV SIR used in composite insulators.