Cell distributions in and sound absorption characteristics of flexible polyurethane foams

In this article, the two-dimensional distributions of cells from the cross section of some flexible polyurethane foams were cleared, and the three-dimensional distributions of cells based on Saltykov's theory were estimated further. As a result, it was found that a mean of the two-dimensional distributions of cells was a good linear relation with a mean of the three-dimensional distributions of cells, and it was confirmed that cell structure of the foams which should have been analyzed in the three-dimensional distributions was evaluated by analysis of the two-dimensional distributions fully. It was also found that not only cell number but also cell distribution was necessary in the evaluation of flexible polyurethane foams, and cell diameter was closely related to the sound absorption coefficient in polyester-based flexible polyurethane foams. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci 65: 1395–1402, 1997