Fabrication and Characterization of Fluorinated Polyimides (PI) Films with Improved Hydrophobic Property

There is a demand for composite films with excellent hydrophobic properties in inertial confinement fusion (ICF) physics experiments. In this paper, we prepared fluorinated polyimide hydrophobic films using spinning and plasma etching methods. The experimental results indicate that the water contact angle for the perfluorodecyltrichlorosilane (PFTS) treatment polyimide (PI) film is 112.0 ∘ ${}^{\circ }$ , which is larger than the pure PI film ( 6 9 . 0 ∘ ) $(69.0^{\circ })$ . The rap oil contact angle is 84.2 ∘ ${}^{\circ }$ , which is also much larger than the contact angle of PI film ( 1 2 . 0 ∘ ) $(12.0^{\circ })$ . Moreover, the surface roughness of the prepared films was measured by white light interferometry (WLI). The surface roughness (Ra) of pure PI is 9.79 $$ nm, but with the application of FSiO 2 particles, the Ra of the films increases to 65.05 $$ nm. After plasma treatment, the Ra of the PI/FSiO 2 composite film increases to 186.71 $$ nm because plasma treatment can scratch the film surface and increase its roughness. However, treating the PI/FSiO 2 composite film with the plasma and PFTS, the Ra is only 88.90 $$ nm. This decrease in Ra is due to the PFTS, which is able to reduce the surface roughness. The development of composite films, compared to pure PI films, could prove to be an extremely valuable material in ICF experiments.