Thermoplastics composites with ductile fiber coatings based on UHMWPE: A study on short fiber GR nylon 6

Abstract Glass microscope slides were initially used to develop a technique for bonding UHMWPE films on to glass and polyamides respectively, as well as to provide a simple physical model for interlayered fiber composites. Further experiments were carried out on glass fibers coated with UHMWPE from a xylene solution, in order to evaluate the applicability of the above technique and of the physical model in actual composite systems. Although great difficulties were encountered in achieving a well boned uniform coating on the glass fibers the results have confirmed the viability of the approach: the impact strength of compression molded glass reinforced Nylon plaques, measured with an instrumented falling weight apparatus, was increased considerably with only a corresponding small loss in flexural modulus. Dynamic mechanical analysis results indicate that a UHMWPE interlayer substantially increases the tan δ of the short fiber composite over a wide temperature range, albeit with some reduction in modulus.