Thermal properties and transition studies of multi-wall carbon nanotube/nylon-6 composites

✍ Scribed by Junchun Yu; Bounphanh Tonpheng; Gerhard Gröbner; Ove Andersson

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2011
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 664 KB
• Volume: 49
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0008-6223
• DOI: 10.1016/j.carbon.2011.07.006

✦ Synopsis

Transition behavior and thermal properties of a multi-wall carbon nanotube (MWCNT)/ nylon-6 composite (P-composite) made by in situ polymerization and subsequently structurally modified by high-pressure-high-temperature treatment have been established.

The thermal conductivity (j) of nylon-6 improved $27% by the addition of 2.1 wt.% MWCNT filler simultaneously as the heat capacity per unit volume decreased $22% compared with that of nylon-6 at 1 atm and 298 K. Moreover, the MWCNT filler raises the glass transition temperature (T g ) of nylon-6, but the pressure dependence of T g remains unchanged. A model for j indicates that the interfacial thermal resistance between the MWCNT filler and the nylon-6 matrix decreases 20% up to 1 GPa and most significantly above 0.8 GPa. P-composite was structurally modified by a sluggish cold-crystallization transition at 1.0 GPa, 530 K, which further increased j by as much as $37% as the crystallinity of nylon-6 improved from 31% to 58% with a preferred crystal orientation and increased crystal size.