Preparation of aqueous anionic poly(urethane‐urea) dispersions. Influence of the incorporation of acrylic, polycarbonate and perfluoro‐oligoether diols on the dispersion and polymer properties

Aqueous poly(urethane‐urea) dispersions were prepared by the prepolymer mixing technique, without using any organic solvent. This work focused on the incorporation into the prepolymer chain of specific macrodiols bearing acrylic, polycarbonate and perfluoro‐oligoether chains, in conjunction with a poly(propylene oxide) diol (Mn = 1000). All the dispersions were synthesized with a fixed NCO/OH ratio, using α,α,α′,α′‐tetramethyl‐1,3‐xylylene diisocayanate, a fixed proportion of emulsifying agent (dimethylol propionic acid, neutralized with triethylamine) and the same chain extender (1,2‐ethylene diamine). The properties of both the dispersions and the dried polymer films were characterized as a function of the nature of the specific incorporated diol and its proportion in the polymer chain, in order to establish criteria leading to an optimized performance in terms of particle size, viscosity, and polymer film properties.