Carbon nanofibers based carbon–carbon composite fibers

Abstract Textile grade polyacrylonitrile (PAN) was used as a precursor material for carbon fiber preparation. E-beam irradiated polyacrylonitrile grafted carbon nanofibers were dispersed in polyacrylonitrile solution (dissolved in dimethyl formamide). Carbon nanofibers (CNF) infused polyacrylonitrile solution was wet spun on a lab-scale wet-spinning setup to form 50 to 70 µm diameter fibers with 3.2 wt.% CNF-PAN, 6.4 wt.% CNF-PAN, and neat PAN. Precursor fibers were characterized for thermal, mechanical and morphological properties using various techniques. Drawing the precursor fibers further enhanced polymer chain orientation and coalesced the voids, enhancing tensile strength and modulus by more than 150% compared to those of the undrawn fibers. Precursor composite fibers on carbonization showed enhanced strength, compared to that of pristine PAN fibers, by four times and stiffness by 14 times. The carbon–carbon composite fibers were further characterized with SEM/FIB, XRD and tensile strength. The property improvements were dependent on the uniform distribution of carbon nanofibers, and surface modification of carbon nanofibers further enabled their dispersion in the composite fibers. Furthermore, 3.2 wt.% CNFs in PAN fibers showed maximum improvement in properties compared to 6.4 wt.% CNF in PAN fibers, indicating that the property enhancements go through a maximum and then drop off due to challenge in getting uniform distribution of nanofibers

Single-step process to improve the mechanical properties of carbon nanotube yarn

Carbon nanotube (CNT) yarns exhibit low tensile strength compared to conventional high-performance carbon fibers due to the facile sliding of CNTs past one another. Electron beam (e-beam) irradiation was employed for in a single-step surface modification of CNTs to improve the mechanical properties of this material. To this end, CNT yarns were simultaneously functionalized and crosslinked using acrylic acid (AA) and acrylonitrile (AN) in an e-beam irradiation process. The chemical modification of CNT yarns was confirmed by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), Raman spectroscopy and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The best improvement in mechanical properties was achieved on a sample treated with an aqueous solution of AA and subsequent irradiation. CNT yarn treatment with AA enhanced the strength (444.5 ± 68.4 MPa) by more than 75% and the modulus (21.5 ± 0.6 GPa) by more than 144% as compared to untreated CNT yarn (strength 251 ± 26.5 MPa and modulus 8.8 ± 1.2 GPa)

Effect of Electron Beam and Gamma Rays on Carbon Nanotube Yarn Structure

<div><p>Individual carbon nanotubes (CNTs) exhibit excellent mechanical, electrical and thermal properties, leading to development of a new generation of advanced lightweight materials and spacecraft electronics substituting the electronics based on silicon. The direct assembly of CNTs into macroscopic fibers or sheets has been a way to overcome their dispersion and processing challenges. Because of a wide range of applications of this material, we investigate effectively the defects on CNT yarns structures created by electron beam and gamma sources and their impact on the morphology and mechanical properties. The irradiated samples with electron beam at doses of 400, 600 and 800 kGy had a decrease in the strength from 219.60 ± 18.90 MPa for pristine yarn to 108.86 ± 23.77, 153.15 ± 21.63, 170.50 ± 25.78 MPa, respectively. The sample irradiated with gamma in air at dose of 100 kGy had the strength increased slightly as compared with the pristine sample and an increase in the elasticity modulus from 8.79 ± 1.19 to 19.63 ± 2.02 GPa as compared to CNT pristine yarn. The quality of the CNT yarns that was gamma irradiated in air with absorbed dose of 100 kGy was not affected by the radiation process with improvement of 123% of the Young’s modulus.</p></div