Enhancements of foamability, electromagnetic interference shielding and mechanical property of epoxy microcellular composite foam with well-dispersed f-MWCNTs. (November 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Gao, Qiang; Zhang, Guangcheng; Fan, Xun; Zhang, Hongming; Zhang, Yu; Huang, Fei; Xiao, Ronglin; Shi, Xuetao; Qin, Jianbin
• Is Part Of: Composites. Volume 138(2020)
• Publication Date: 2020-11
• Subjects: Microcellular foam -- Epoxy -- Functionalized MWCNTs -- Supercritical carbon dioxide foaming; Composite materials -- Periodicals; Manufacturing processes -- Periodicals; Composite materials; Manufacturing processes; Periodicals; 620.11805
• DOI: 10.1016/j.compositesa.2020.106060
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1359-835X

Abstract

Abstract: In this work, the well-dispersed functionalized MWCNTs (f-MWCNTs), which was fabricated by simply decorating the polyether amine (M2070) and organosilanes (KH560) chains, has been applied as filler in preparation of the epoxy/f-MWCNTs microcellular foam through batch foaming process with supercritical carbon dioxide (scCO2 ). Compared with acidified MWCNT (acid-MWCNTs) without decorating the organic groups, the f-MWCNTs achieved more uniform dispersion in epoxy matrix, acted as plasticizing agent to reduce the glass transition temperature (Tg ) of epoxy/f-MWCNTs composites, as well as increasing the composite CO2 adsorption ability, hence greatly enhanced the foamability of epoxy/f-MWCNTs composite. By adding 20 wt% f-MWCNTs, the average cell size reduced from 46.32 μm to 0.21 μm and cell density increased from 2.70 × 10 7 cell/cm 3 to 2.74 × 10 13 cell/cm 3, respectively. In addition, the epoxy/f-MWCNTs microcellular foams presented enhanced electrical conductivity to 5.2 × 10 −4 S/m, electromagnetic interference shielding effectiveness (EMI SE) to 22.73 dB and compressive strength to 26.46 MPa.