Composite materials with glass reinforcement (fiberglass) are basic electrical insulators and therefore not compatible with ATEX areas or where static electricity can generate forms of explosion.
In order to guarantee the use of glass fiber reinforced composites in ATEX areas, acetylene black in
percentages of 1-2% has been added to polyester resins for the past 30 years in order to obtain a dielectric strength of less than 200KΩ. m.
Acetylene black is obtained from the thermal decomposition process of acetylene, it is a highly purified
product and is extremely conductive.
Acetylene black is included in the carbon black family but does not result from the incomplete combustion of heavy petroleum products like other carbon blacks widely used in tires.
Again in 2001, together with the Department of Electronics, Electrotechnical and Computer Science of the University of Trieste, Carbon Compositi srl verified the possibility of using conductive surface veils to reduce the surface resistance of composite products used in the nautical (IMO Resolutions A.753) and industrial sectors.
The use of these conductive veils allows an improvement of the conductive characteristics and of the
production phases of the composite components.
At the moment there are several manufacturers of conductive webs that offer a wide range of conductive
surface webs with different characteristics, workability and performance, which allow to cover all the needs of producers of composite materials.
For example, the veils of PFG USA or RYMYC srl.
