New Synthetic Procedure for the Preparation and Manufacture ofPerfluoropolyethers

摘要

Perfluoropolyethers are an extraordinary class of high-performance fluids whichare useful as high temperature lubricants and for many other applications. Lower molecular weight perfluoropolyethers are used for applications such as vapor phase soldering fluids, thermal shock fluids and inert fluids. While the first perfluoropolyethers appeared in the early 1970s, the technology that will dominate this field and the associated industry is emerging from our research laboratories at The University of Texas at Austin and at Exfluor Research Corporation. Our research group has already synthesized more new structures of perfluoropolyether lubricant fluids than all other sources combined. In our laboratories, controlled reactions of hydrocarbon starting materials and elemental fluorine have been pursued first on a small scale in the academic laboratory and scaled up very effectively at Exfluor Research Corporation. Currently, the highest molecular weight perfluoropolyether obtainable by others using conventional polymerization processes is 50,000--with a viscous syruplike consistency. Perfluoropolyethers, Direct fluorination, Lubricants.