| Carbon fiber reinforced polymers are excellent candidates for aerospace, automobile and other mobile applications due to their high specific strength and modulus. The most prominent aerospace application of carbon fiber composites in recent times is the Boeing 787 Dreamliner, which is the world's first major commercial airliner to extensively use composite materials. The critical issue, which needs to be addressed hereby, is long-term safety. Hence, long-term durability of composite materials in such applications becomes a point of concern. Conventional polymer matrices, such as thermosetting resins, which are used as matrix material in carbon fiber composites, are susceptible to degradation in the form of chemical corrosion, UV degradation and moisture, in severe environmental conditions. Fluorinated polymers offer a viable alternative as matrix material, due to their reduced susceptibility to environmental degradation. The epoxy system used in this study is fluorinated Tetra-glycidyl methylene di-aniline (6F-TGMDA), which was developed by polymer scientists at NASA Langley Research Center. The hydrophobic nature of this epoxy makes it a potential matrix material in aerospace applications. However, its compatibility in carbon fiber-reinforced composites remains to be investigated. This study aims to characterize the interfacial properties in carbon fiber reinforced fluorinated epoxy composites. Typical interfacial characterization parameters, like interfacial shear strength, estimated from the microbond test, proved to be inadequate in accurately estimating adhesion since it assumes a uniform distribution of stresses along the embedded fiber length. Also, it does not account for any residual stresses present at the interface, which might arise due to thermal expansion differences and Poisson's ratio differences of the fiber and matrix. Hence, an analytical approach, which calculates adhesion pressure at the interface, was adopted. This required determination of the unknown mechanical and physical properties of the resin, the relaxation modulus (determined using nano-indentation) and coefficient of thermal expansion (determined using coherent gradient sensing). The adhesional pressure for 6F TGMDA-carbon fiber interface was found to be 135.48 MPa compared to 138.47 MPa for the Diamino diphenyl sulphone (DDS) cured TGMDA-carbon fiber interface. The fact that the adhesional pressure does not show significant decrease upon fluorination of the epoxy system is an advantage. The hydrophobicity of fluorine can be utilized to manufacture environmentally resistant composites while keeping the level of interfacial adhesion the same as in the case of conventional epoxy system, DDS cured TGMDA. |
