• Polymer(Korea)
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.218-226
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• 2002

For the preparation of high resilience polyurethane (PU) foams with polyether type cell openers which have different ethylene oxide (EO) content, molecular weight and chain structure, the influences of tell opener structure on the kinetics, rheology, structural stability, open cell content and mechanical properties of the obtained foam were investigated. It was observed that urea formation reaction was delayed with the increase of EO content and incorporation of ester linkage in cell opener molecule and was relatively independent on the molecular weight. With the rheological studies, the decreases of viscosity and storage modulus were confirmed for the increase of EO content and molecular weight, so that the resulted foam had low structural stability and high open cell content. The cell opener having ester linkage in molecule exhibited the lowest values of viscosity and storage modulus and the obtained foam has high open cell content. However, the structural stability increased due to the larger intermolecular interaction of ester linkage. The hardness, tensile strength, tear strength and elongation of foam were deteriorated with increase of EO content and molecular weight of tell opener. On the other hand, the cell opener having ester linkage in molecule improved the values of tensile strength, tear strength and elongation.