Enhanced Tensile Properties of Multi-Walled Carbon Nanotubes Filled Polyamide 6 Composites Based on Interface Modification and Reactive Extrusion

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.

Keywords

• polymer-matrix composites
• carbon nanotubes
• micro-mechanics