Improving carbon fiber adhesion to polyimide with atmospheric pressure plasma treatment

Plasma treatment is frequently used to modify carbon fiber surfaces to improve adhesion of the fiber to matrices although it may also influence carbon fiber tensile strength. In order to determine the effect of atmospheric pressure plasma treatment on carbon fiber tensile strength and interfacial bonding strength to polyimide, polyacrylonitrile (PAN) based carbon fibers are treated with atmospheric pressure oxygen/helium plasmas for different durations. Tensile strength change of the fiber is studied at different gage lengths before and after the plasma treatment. Interfacial bonding between the carbon fiber and a thermoplastic polyimide matrix is evaluated using a single fiber composite test system. Weibull analysis of the single fiber tensile test data shows no obvious changes in the tensile strength at short gage lengths after plasma treatment while the fiber strength tends to decrease at larger gage lengths. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) show that the plasma treatments roughen the fiber surfaces. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) analysis of fiber surface shows a significant increase of oxygen concentration after plasma treatment and the oxygen containing functional groups reach their maximum levels after 32 s treatment time and further increasing treatment time does not achieve a higher level of oxidation. Plasma treatments decrease dynamic water contact angles and increase the surface energy of the carbon fibers as measured by the modified Wilhelmy method. The interfacial shear strength is improved 21% after the atmospheric pressure plasma treatment for 32 s. It is concluded that the increase of oxygen containing functional groups and changing of the surface topology may contribute collectively to the improvement of fiber/resin interfacial adhesion.