Morphology and fracture properties of toughened highly crosslinked epoxy composites: A comparative study between high and low Tg tougheners
(2016) Composites Part B: Engineering — Vol. 101, p. 14-20 (2016)
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- Authors
Bailly, Christian 
- Abstract
- The mechanical properties of an unmodified reference composite panel based on a highly crosslinked epoxy resin are compared with several corresponding toughened versions, all containing the same amount of representative hard or soft tougheners. The panels are prepared and tested under identical conditions. In terms of tougheners, soft MAM block copolymers and CTBN rubber are compared with two high glass transition temperature (Tg) amorphous thermoplastics, PES and phenoxy. The high Tg thermoplastic tougheners yield considerable improvements of the composites mechanical properties, especially the interlaminar fracture toughness, as compared to the reference panel. On the contrary, MAM and CTBN modification are much less effective. The analysis of the morphology strongly suggests that effective toughening of composite panels based on densely crosslinked epoxy resins requires the combination of at least two key factors: (i) a fine dispersion of the toughener and (ii) strong matrixtoughener and matrix-carbon fibers interfaces. The study provides valuable insights for the choice of suitable tougheners for high performance epoxy systems, based on the link with the physical toughening mechanisms.
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Citations
Van Velthem, P., Ballout, W., Horion, J., Janssens, Y.-A., Destoop, V., Pardoen, T., & Bailly, C. (2016). Morphology and fracture properties of toughened highly crosslinked epoxy composites: A comparative study between high and low Tg tougheners. Composites Part B: Engineering, 101, 14-20. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compositesb.2016.06.076 (Original work published 2016)