A study of oxyfluorination of multi-walled carbon nanotubes on mechanical interfacial properties of epoxy matrix nanocomposites

Multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) were oxyfluorinated at several different temperatures. The changes of surface properties of oxyfluorinated MWNTs were investigated using FT-IR, EDS and XRD. The treated MWNTs were embedded in the epoxy resin and the fracture behavior of the resulting composites was determined by impact and fracture toughness tests. From the surface analysis, it was found that surface fluorine and oxygen contents increased with increasing oxyfluorination temperature and showed a maximum value at 100 °C. This led to an increase of surface polarity of the MWNTs, resulting in increasing KIC and impact strength of the composites, due to the improvement of interfacial adhesion force between the MWNTs and the epoxy matrix.