Preparation and properties of graphene oxide/natural rubber composites

Abstract

Graphene oxide(GO) was modified with caprolactam (CPL) to obtain CPL-GO, then CPL-GO/natural rubber (NR) composites were prepared by melt blending method after combining with NR. The effect of amount of CPL-GO on the physical and mechanical properties, interfacial interaction and gas barrier properties of CPL-GO/NR composites were investigated. The results showed that the spacing of X-ray diffraction layers of CPL-GO increased, the GO lamellar stacking became looser, the water contact angle of CPL-GO increased to 91.2°, which contributed to the good dispersion of GO in the rubber matrix. When the mass fraction of CPL-GO was 2.0%, the tensile strength of CPL-GO/NR composite was 26.1 MPa, which was 50.9% higher than that of pure NR. With the increasing amount of CPL-GO, the storage modulus of the composite increased, and the peak value of the loss factor decreased. It indicated that the composite of GO after surface modification of CPL compounded with NR enhanced the interaction between the two-phase interfaces, which improved the ability of the composite to resist deformation. At 40 ℃, when the mass fraction of CPL-GO was 3.0%, the gas permeability coefficient of CPL-GO/NR composite decreased by 57.1% compared with that of pure NR.

Keywords

• caprolactam， graphene oxide， natural rubber，physical and mechanical property，
• mechanical property，
• interfacial interaction， gas permeability coefficient，