Electrical, mechanical and damage self-sensing properties of basalt fiber reinforced polymer composites modified by electrophoretic deposition

Abstract

In this work, basalt fiber reinforced polymer (BFRP) with enhanced electrical, mechanical properties and in-situ damage self-sensing capability was prepared using carboxylic carbon nanotubes (COOH-CNTs) modified BF fabrics via electrophoretic deposition (EPD) at different voltages. The BFRP with BF fabrics modified at a deposition voltage of 20 ​V (EPD20-BFRP) showed the lowest electrical resistivity. Compared with unmodified BFRP, the tensile and flexual moduli of EPD20-BFRP increased by 37.5 ​% and 14.9 ​%, respectively. Single-layer EPD20-BFRP exhibited a high gauge factor (GF) of 44.3 during tensile damage self-sensing. The acoustic emission (AE) signals during tensile and flexual damage process agreed well with the relative resistance changes (RRC), which confirmed different damage stages within loading process, such as elastic deformation, damage evolution, crack coalescence, and complete fracture. In addition, the multi-layer BFRP containing a single-layer EPD20-BFRP on the upper or lower surface of laminate exhibited distinct electrical signal responses subjected to the flexural loading.