Graphene reinforced nanocomposites: manufacturing and characterization

Abstract

The main problem encountered in the production of graphene reinforced nanocomposites is the agglomeration of graphene particles in the matrix material. Since the agglomerated graphene particles act as an impurity, not as a reinforcement element in the matrix material, a decrease is observed in the mechanical properties of the produced nano composite instead of an increase. In order to prevent this situation two strategies used, a three-roll milling device to disperse and Triton X-100 surfactant for functionalization were used in this study. The properties that affect the mechanical properties of the nanocomposite produced, such as the roller speed and the distance between the rollers in the three-roll milling method, and the Triton X-100 ratio in the functionalization method, were determined by a detailed literature review. After determining the production method, samples were produced at two different graphene ratios (0.1 and 0.5 wt%) and the effect of graphene ratio on mechanical properties was investigated. Since epoxy resin is a polymer material, it is also important to determine its time-dependent properties. For this reason, the viscoelastic and viscoplastic properties of the produced nanocomposites were determined by repeating the experiments at three different strain rates (1.E-3, 1.E-2 and 1.E-1 /s). As a result, in this study, the optimum method for the production of graphene-epoxy nano-composites was determined and an improvement of up to 29% in elasticity modulus and up to 18% in yield strength was observed in nano-composite specimens produced with this method, compared to pure epoxy specimens. The mechanical properties of nanocomposites were brought to the literature by performing compression tests at different strain rates on the specimens produced with different graphene percentages.