Effect of ultrasonication on the properties of multi-walled carbon nanotubes/ hollow glass microspheres/epoxy syntactic foam

Abstract

Multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) reinforced hollow glass microspheres (HGMs)/epoxy syntactic foam was fabricated. The effects of ultrasonication on the density, compression strength, and water absorption properties were studied. Better dispersed MWCNTs can be obtained after ultrasonication treatment, but an increasing viscosity will lead to a larger amount of voids during syntactic foam preparation especially when the content of HGMs is more than 70 vol%. The existing voids will decrease the density of epoxy syntactic foam. However, the ultrasonication does not change the compression strength much. Ultrasonication treatment will decrease the water absorption content due to the better dispersion and hydrophobic properties of MWCNTs. But a significant increase of water absorption content occurs when HGMs is more than 70 vol%, which is attributed to the higher viscosity and larger amount of voids.

Keywords

carbon nanotubes / hollow glass microspheres / syntactic foam / ultrasonication

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