Elaboration of a fire retardant coating for polyamide-6 using cold plasma polymerization of a fluorinated acrylate

In order to improve the fire retardancy properties of the polyamide-6 (PA6), a low-pressure microwave plasma process has been investigated to graft and polymerize the fluorinated acrylate monomer 1,1,2,2-tetrahydroperfluorodecyl acrylate (AC8) onto the PA6. The grafting and the polymerization processes were characterized by XPS, IR (ATR) and SEM. The fire retardant performance of the treated PA6 has been evaluated by the cone calorimeter technique. The rate of heat released of coated PA6 was decreased by approximately 50% in comparison to the virgin PA6. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.