Rigid Polyurethane Composites Reinforced with Carbon Fibers Decorated with a Skein‐like Silver Coating

Abstract

AbstractComposites with high strength and toughness are the goals that people pursue. However, the strength and toughness of composites are generally contradictory, and the performances of carbon fibers (CFs) reinforced composites mainly depend on the interfacial bonding strength between fibers and matrix. By observing the skein, we designed a coating similar to the skein on the CF surface, so that the matrix could penetrate into the cavities of the “skein” to improve the interface bonding strength of the composites. In this work, the skein‐like silver coating was obtained on the CF surface by electrodeposition method, and the rigid polyurethane (RPU) matrix composites were prepared to evaluate the properties of materials. Compared with pure RPU, the strength and toughness of skein‐like Ag‐CFs/RPU composites were significantly improved by 87.1 % and 70.2 %, respectively. The satisfactory results were due to the skein‐like silver coating on the fiber surface. The skein structure made the interface between the matrix and the fibers stronger through penetration, and it could also play a pinning role and increase the crack propagation path. The silver coating also gave the composites better electromagnetic properties, which reflected the conductivity and electromagnetic interference shielding performances were 2.4×10−5 S/M and 59.83 dB, respectively.