Abstract
Graphene nanoplatelet (GNP) modified epoxy nanocomposites are becoming attractive to aerospace due to possible improvements in their mechanical, electrical and thermal properties at no weight cost. The process of obtaining reliable material systems provides many challenges, especially at larger scale (a volume effect). This paper reports on the main fabrication stages of GNP-based epoxy composites, namely (i) pre-dispersion, (ii) dispersion, and (iii) post-dispersion. Each stage is developed to show the interest and potential it delivers for property enhancement. Chemical modification of GNP is presented; functionalisation by Triton X-100 shows elastic modulus improvements of the epoxy at low particle content (≤3%). The post-dispersion step as an alignment of GNP into the epoxy by an electrical field is discussed. The electrical conductivity is below the simulated percolation threshold and an improvement of the thermal diffusivity of 220% when compared to non-oriented GNP epoxy sample is achieved. The work demonstrates how the addition of functionalised graphene platelets to an epoxy resin will allow it to act as electrical and thermal conductor rather than as insulator
Highlights
Composite materials are used in many lightweight applications, mainly in transport and energy industries
The mechanical properties of functionalised graphene nanoplatelets (GNP)/epoxy composites show improvement of the interfacial bond, and alignment of GNP using an electrical field show an improvement in thermal diffusivity of 220% compared to non-oriented GNP/epoxy nanocomposites
The value was slightly higher than is found in this paper. This may be due to the curing process, the dispersion method, or the specific type of GNP used, confirming that every single modification in the manufacture of GNP based epoxy nanocomposites have an impact of the mechanical properties
Summary
Composite materials are used in many lightweight applications, mainly in transport (aerospace, automotive) and energy (oil, gas & wind turbine) industries. Using the Bscotch tape^ method (mechanical exfoliation), they proved theoretical properties of graphene such as graphene’s band structure and its linear relation of dispersion. Since this discovery, further research was completed to exploit the exceptional properties of this material [2, 3]. Graphene is a 2D material; if we consider only one single layer graphene (SLG), it compounds of sp carbon atoms which form a honeycomb structure. GNP are generally composed of ten to a hundred layers of graphene, which leads to lower properties than SLG, but retains some of these including high electron mobility, and high mechanical and thermal performance. In terms of mechanical behaviour, GNP exhibit good tensile modulus of the order of 1 TPa, but possess a lower bending resistance [5]
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