Alignment of Carbon Nanotubes and Graphite Particles in Polymer Composites Induced by an Electrical Field

In this study, the effectiveness of applying electrical field during molding to increase electrical conductivity of composite sheets based on vinyl ester resin has been investigated. Vinyl ester resin was mixed with various amounts of multi-wall carbon nanotube and graphite particles and then, casted into sheets. A constant electrical voltage was applied to the metallic casting mold while the current was recorded in two states, with curing and without curing. It was found that applying electrical field has trivial effect on electrical conductivity of the base resin. The results showed that the electrical conductivity of the sheets can be improved by applying electrical field however this improvement was not as high as it is expected when considering previous studies in this field. This improvement is more significant at low filler content but vanishes as the filler content increases

Keywords:

Electrical field , Alignment , Composite , Carbon nanotube , Graphite , Vinyl Ester Resin