Résumé
Fluoropolymers have emerged as a unique class of materials due to a combination of their versatile nature (ranging from thermoplastics to plastomers, elastomers, and thermoplastic elastomers) and interesting properties such as excellent chemical/thermal/weather resistance, high repellency toward oil, water and soil, low refractive index/flammability/dielectric constants and improved resistance to hydrolytic and oxidative degradation. Thus, these polymers have increasingly found applications in automotive and petrochemical industries, aeronautics, aerospace, microelectronics, wire and cable industries. Compared to fluorinated homopolymers which are crystalline and difficult to cure/cross-link, fluorinated elastomers can be easily cured due to their low crystallinity arising out of disorganized or amorphous structure. This chapter mainly focuses on fluorinated thermoplastic elastomers (TPEs), ranging from (per)fluorocarbon elastomers to fluorophosphazenes and fluorosilicones. In order to maintain the length of the section succinct, this chapter will give a generally concise study of the recent and exciting developments in the field of fluorinated TPEs, as opposed to giving an extensive account of the field. Fluorinated (co)polymers in general and fluorinated TPEs have picked up some interests from both academic world and industry due to their unique properties (such as excellent hydrophobicity, oleophobicity, antisticking and thermal properties) and potential emerging applications.