Abstract
To induce uniform dispersion and excellent interfacial properties, we adopted a strategy of combining both polyamide 6 (PA6) grafting for multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) and reactive extrusion of PA6 matrix, based on anionic ring-opening polymerization of ε-caprolactam (CL). Compared to –COOH and –NCO treatments of MWCNTs, enhanced MWCNT dispersion and tensile properties of the composites were achieved using the applied strategy, and the tensile strength and modulus of the PA6-grafted MWCNT-filled PA6 composites were 5.3% and 20.5% higher than those of the purified MWCNT-filled PA6 composites, respectively. In addition, they were almost similar to the theoretical ones calculated by the modified Mori–Tanaka method (MTM) assuming a perfect interface, indicating that the tensile properties of MWCNT-filled PA6 composites can be optimized by PA6 grafting and reactive extrusion based on the anionic ring-opening polymerization of CL due to uniform MWCNT dispersion and excellent interfacial property.
Highlights
Since their discovery [1], carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have been of great interest as an efficient reinforcement that can improve the mechanical properties of polymer composites due to their excellent mechanical properties such as 11–150 GPa tensile strength and 0.4–4.15 TPa tensile modulus [2,3,4].there have been few reports on the successful development of CNT-based high strength polymer composites to meet researchers’ expectations [5,6]
Fourier transform transform infrared infrared spectroscopy spectroscopy (FTIR) spectra are shown in Figure 2a to observe the surface functionality of multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) by the applied surface treatments
Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) images are shown in Figure 3 to observe the structural changes in MWCNTs by the surface treatments
Summary
Since their discovery [1], carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have been of great interest as an efficient reinforcement that can improve the mechanical properties of polymer composites due to their excellent mechanical properties such as 11–150 GPa tensile strength and 0.4–4.15 TPa tensile modulus [2,3,4]. The manufacturing process of composite materials filled with CNTs can be classified into three main types based on the dispersion method: melt mixing, solution mixing, and in-situ polymerization [4, 6,21,22,23]. The melt mixing method is the most economical but is difficult to induce sufficient dispersion Solution mixing makes it easy to generate uniform dispersion, but it is not economical due to the use of a solvent and the long drying process. For this reason, an in-situ polymerization process based on an economical melting process can be selected, while inducing sufficient dispersion. By comparing between the measured tensile properties and the theoretically calculated ones based on the modified Mori–Tanaka method (MTM), interfacial properties of the composites were evaluated
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