Abstract
A comparative study of elastic properties and mode I fracture energy has been presented between conventional carbon fibre (CF)/epoxy and advanced carbon nanotube (CNT)/epoxy laminated composite materials. The volume fraction of CNT fibres has been considered as 15%, 30%, and 60% whereas; the volume fraction of CF has been kept constant at 60%. Three stacking sequences of the laminates viz.[0/0/0/0], [0/90/0/90] and [0/30/–30/90] have been considered in the present analysis. Periodic microstructure model has been used to calculate the elastic properties of the laminated composites. It has been observed analytically that the addition of only 15% CNT in epoxy will give almost the same value of longitudinal Young’s modulus as compared to the addition of 60% CF in epoxy. Finite element (FE) analysis of double cantilever beam specimens made from laminated composite has also been performed. It has been observed from FE analysis that the addition of 15% CNT in epoxy will also give almost the same value of mode I fracture energy as compared to the addition of 60% CF in epoxy. The value of mode I fracture energy for [0/0/0/0] laminated composite is two times higher than the other two types of laminated composites.
Highlights
Discovery of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) by Iijima in 1991 brought a revolution in research in the field of nanotechnology [1]
The elastic properties i.e. Young’s modulus, in-plane shear modulus and Poisson’s ratio; and the mode I fracture energy (GI) of the CNT/epoxy laminated composites have been calculated for different volume fractions of CNT but for carbon fibre (CF)/epoxy both the properties have been calculated for a constant CF volume fraction of 60%
Three different laminate stacking sequences have been considered for the calculation of elastic properties and GI of the CNT/epoxy and CF/epoxy laminated composites
Summary
Discovery of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) by Iijima in 1991 brought a revolution in research in the field of nanotechnology [1]. In the present study, the elastic properties (i.e. Young’s modulus, shear modulus and Poisson’s ratio), and mode I fracture energy of CNT/epoxy laminated composites have been determined with a high volume fraction of CNT up to 60%.
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