Mechanical and low-velocity impact properties of epoxy-composite beams reinforced by MWCNTs

Abstract

The effect of different weight percentages (wt.%) of MWCNTs includes 0, 0.17, 0.34 and 0.51% on the mechanical and low-velocity impact properties are presented on the example of the pure epoxy and epoxy/fiberglass composites beams. A sonication technique is used to disperse MWCNTs in the epoxy network and the nanocomposite beams are fabricated using hand lay-up technique. In tensile tests, the value of Young’s modulus, tensile strength and strain at break are reported. In the low-velocity impact tests on the MWCNTs/fiberglass/epoxy, the time-history response of contact force, displacement and velocity of the impactor and indentation and displacement of the beam are measured and presented. The results show that compared to pure epoxy, Young’s modulus and tensile strength of epoxy/MWCNTs are increased 21.98% and 58.32% at 0.34 wt.% of CNTs, respectively, and raised 1.05 and 1.17 times at 0.17 wt.% of CNTs for the epoxy/fiberglass/MWCNTs, respectively. It is observed that the excellent improvement in the impact properties is achieved for 0.34 wt.% of CNTs. A series of polynomial formulations as a function of wt.% of CNTs are proposed to calculate the Young’s modulus, peak contact force and maximum beam deflection at the impact position.