Welding of thermoplastics by means of carbon-nanotube web

Giuseppe Catalanotti; Brian Falzon; Massimiliano Russello; Stephen Hawkins

doi:10.1016/j.coco.2019.11.001

Welding of thermoplastics by means of carbon-nanotube web

Giuseppe Catalanotti, Brian Falzon, Massimiliano Russello, Stephen Hawkins

School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

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Abstract

We report the welding of thermoplastic materials by means of embedded fully-aligned carbon nanotube (CNT) web. Layers of CNT web (each layer of which has a densified thickness of 50 nm) were placed between two polyether ether ketone (PEEK) films to create a resilient insert which was then embedded between two bonding interfaces. An electrical current was passed through the CNT webs to activate Joule heating, melting the insert and adjacent surfaces of the thermoplastic parts. Preliminary experiments on welded PEEK samples show that the tensile strength of the welded specimens reached 96% of the strength of the pristine material, even before optimizing the processing conditions. The potential of this welding technology is evident: the inserts are ultra-thin, highly flexible, so can conform to bonding surfaces of complex shape, and the anisotropy of the CNT-web provides an additional variable for optimizing the electro-thermal response.

Original language	English
Journal	Composites Communications
Early online date	06 Nov 2019
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coco.2019.11.001
Publication status	Early online date - 06 Nov 2019

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Welding of thermoplastics by means of carbon-nanotube web
Copyright 2019 Elsevier. This manuscript is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits distribution and reproduction for non-commercial purposes, provided the author and source are cited.
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abstract = "We report the welding of thermoplastic materials by means of embedded fully-aligned carbon nanotube (CNT) web. Layers of CNT web (each layer of which has a densified thickness of 50 nm) were placed between two polyether ether ketone (PEEK) films to create a resilient insert which was then embedded between two bonding interfaces. An electrical current was passed through the CNT webs to activate Joule heating, melting the insert and adjacent surfaces of the thermoplastic parts. Preliminary experiments on welded PEEK samples show that the tensile strength of the welded specimens reached 96% of the strength of the pristine material, even before optimizing the processing conditions. The potential of this welding technology is evident: the inserts are ultra-thin, highly flexible, so can conform to bonding surfaces of complex shape, and the anisotropy of the CNT-web provides an additional variable for optimizing the electro-thermal response.",

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AU - Russello, Massimiliano

AU - Hawkins, Stephen

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Y1 - 2019/11/6

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AB - We report the welding of thermoplastic materials by means of embedded fully-aligned carbon nanotube (CNT) web. Layers of CNT web (each layer of which has a densified thickness of 50 nm) were placed between two polyether ether ketone (PEEK) films to create a resilient insert which was then embedded between two bonding interfaces. An electrical current was passed through the CNT webs to activate Joule heating, melting the insert and adjacent surfaces of the thermoplastic parts. Preliminary experiments on welded PEEK samples show that the tensile strength of the welded specimens reached 96% of the strength of the pristine material, even before optimizing the processing conditions. The potential of this welding technology is evident: the inserts are ultra-thin, highly flexible, so can conform to bonding surfaces of complex shape, and the anisotropy of the CNT-web provides an additional variable for optimizing the electro-thermal response.

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Welding of thermoplastics by means of carbon-nanotube web

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