When most people still equate silicone oil with "lubricating oil", a technological revolution around ethyl silicone oil has quietly been completed.


Yu Pengfei, the business unit manager of Xinyuan Chemical (Shandong) Co., Ltd., revealed at an industry technical exchange meeting that the company has successfully overcome the preparation technology of ultra-low temperature resistant ethyl silicone oil and fluorinated silicone oil, and has obtained 20 national invention patents, winning the first prize of Shandong Province Small and Medium sized Enterprise Science and Technology Progress Award. As the only high-tech enterprise in China with a full industry chain production line for fluorosilicone materials, Xinyuan Chemical has been laying out high-end fluorine-containing new materials since the beginning of this century. Its product line covers trifluoropropene, high-temperature and room temperature vulcanized fluorosilicone rubber, liquid fluorosilicone rubber, and fluorosilicone oil.


At the same time, the application boundaries of ethyl silicone oil are being significantly expanded.


From the performance data, ethyl silicone oil (CAS number 63148-61-8) has outstanding advantages such as low viscosity with temperature change, low vapor pressure (only 0.532mmHg at 25 ℃), low surface tension, and non toxicity and non corrosion. Its low temperature resistance and lubricity are even better than traditional dimethyl silicone oil. More importantly, it can be miscible with mineral oil in any proportion - this characteristic makes it irreplaceable in the formulation of high-performance lubricants and hydraulic oils.


In practical applications, ethyl silicone oil has penetrated into multiple high-end scenarios. In the field of liquid cooling and heat dissipation, it is used for liquid cooled silicone oil in data centers, requiring low volatility and high purity; In the field of aerospace electronics, as the core component of thermal conductive silicone grease, it needs to withstand extreme temperature changes; In the field of precision instruments, it serves as instrument oil and damping fluid, with the core indicator being viscosity stability; In the field of rubber and plastics, as an efficient release agent, it can directly replace mineral oil; In the healthcare field, medical grade ethyl silicone oil requires physiological inertness to ensure safety and non irritation.


It is worth noting that at the 2024 Organic Silicon Fine Chemicals Technology Exchange Conference, ethyl silicone oil was listed as one of the key discussion directions. The attending experts unanimously agreed that high-quality ethyl silicone oil is still a scarce variety in China, and the long-term dependence on imports for high-end products urgently needs to be reversed.


From the industry report in 2012 stating that "high-end silicone oil products still need to be imported", to 2026, companies such as New Asia Strong and New Yuan Chemical have successively made breakthroughs in liquid cooling and ultra-low temperature fields. Domestic ethyl silicone oil is accelerating along the path of "high-end, specialized, and domestic substitution". This track is far from the end.