Abstract
High-strength conducting polymer composites are in high demand in modern aerospace and automobile industries. Therefore, a thermosetting conducting polymer system, polyaniline (PANI) doped with dodecylbenzenesulfonic acid (DBSA) interconnected with divinylbenzene (DVB), has been used to design high-loading multiwalled carbon nanotube (MWCNT)-reinforced composites. Herein, MWCNTs were used on a macroscale in the form of bucky paper (BP) and as secondary reinforcement in the matrix system. The mechanical and electrical properties of the resultant BP reinforced PANI-DBSA-DVB (PDD) composites were investigated. The maximum flexural strength and storage modulus were 45.8 MPa and 18.5 GPa, obtained in 16ply MWCNT BP composite with 0.05 wt% dispersed MWCNT (16ply0.05), representing overall improvements of ∼48.2% and ∼55.4%, respectively, compared with the neat PDD matrix system. The maximum in-plane and through-plane electrical conductivities of the 16ply0.05 composite were 39.5 and 1.4 S cm−1, which were three and two orders of magnitude higher, respectively, compared with those of neat PDD matrix. This high electrical conductivity resulted in a maximum electromagnetic power loss of −37.5 dBm for the 16Ply0.05 composite, which represented an overall improvement of ∼231% over the neat PDD system. Furthermore, the effect of secondary phase of MWCNTs was investigated using FT-IR, UV-Vis, and DSC analyses.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 12396-12406 |
| Number of pages | 11 |
| Journal | Journal of Materials Chemistry C |
| Volume | 6 |
| Issue number | 45 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - 2018 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Funding
We would like to thank Director NPL for providing permission to publish the results, and Mr Jai Tawale and Mrs Shaveta Sharma for conducting SEM and Raman measurements, respectively. Sushant Sharma wishes to thank CSIR for providing travel allowance to conduct collaborative research at the University of Tokyo, Japan, and the Graduate School of Engineering, University of Tokyo, for organising the summer training program 2017. We would also like to thank Dr Bhasker Gahtori for conducting VSM measurements and Dr Satya Kesh Dubey for performing electromagnetic power loss measurements and analysis.
| Funders | Funder number |
|---|---|
| Graduate School of Engineering, University of Tokyo | |
| Council of Scientific and Industrial Research, India | |
| University of Tokyo |