Fibre reinforced composites with bicontinuous silica-epoxy matrices
File(s)
Published version
Author(s)
Shaw, Charles
Anthony, David
Hamerton, Ian
Shaffer, Milo
Type
Conference Paper
Abstract
Bicontinuous silica-epoxy nanocomposites are promising matrices for fibre composites due to the long-range connectivity of their reinforcing silica phase. This silica aerogel-derived reinforcement has been shown to give improvements in matrix compressive and shear moduli, key factors governing the overall compression performance of fibre composite materials. The synthesis of such hierarchical fibre-reinforced materials proceeds via an intermediate silica aerogel-fibre composite. Whilst silica aerogel and fibre reinforcement have previously been combined for thermal insulation applications little is reported concerning the fabrication of long-range mesoporous silica networks in the presence of continuous ordered high-performance fibre reinforcements. Here, a capillary-rise type method is proposed for applying such continuous silica aerogel to woven glass and carbon fibre reinforcements. Fibre sizing is varied to investigate the influence of interfacial chemistry on the wetting of fibres by aerogel precursor sol and the resulting aerogel morphology. Polyurethane-sized carbon fibre is found to be wetted well by the sol precursor leading to a thin, continuous mostly crack-free coating of silica
aerogel which bridges adjacent fibres. This observation was accompanied by a reasonable fibre content of 49 vol.%. In contrast, epoxy-sized and de-sized carbon fibre leads to poor wetting and large, cracked excess of silica aerogel.
aerogel which bridges adjacent fibres. This observation was accompanied by a reasonable fibre content of 49 vol.%. In contrast, epoxy-sized and de-sized carbon fibre leads to poor wetting and large, cracked excess of silica aerogel.
Date Issued
2025-07-02
Date Acceptance
2024-05-01
Citation
Proceedings of the 21st European Conference on Composite Materials, 2025, 8, pp.219-226
ISBN
978-2-912985-01-9
Publisher
The European Society for Composite Materials (ESCM) and the Ecole Centrale de Nantes
Start Page
219
End Page
226
Journal / Book Title
Proceedings of the 21st European Conference on Composite Materials
Volume
8
Copyright Statement
©2024 ECCM21/The publishers The Proceedings are published under the CC BY-NC 4.0 license in electronic format only, by the Publisher. The CC BY-NC 4.0 license permits non-commercial reuse, transformation, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. For commercial reuse, please contact the authors. For further details please read the full legal code at: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/legalcode
License URL
Source
European Conference on Composite Materials
Publication Status
Published
Start Date
2024-07-02
Finish Date
2024-07-05
Coverage Spatial
Nantes, France