Strength and Time-dependent Behaviour of Single-walled Carbon Nanotube Ropes and their Composites

III-7: Strength and Time-dependent Behavior of single-walled Carbon Nanotube ropes and their composites

1: Y. Ren, H. Zhang, Y.Q. Fu, K. Liao
2: F. Li, H. M. Cheng,
3: T. Xiao, and
  1. School of Mechanical and Production Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639798
  2. Shenyang National Laboratory for Materials Science, Institute of Metal Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 72 Wenhua Road, Shenyang 110016, China
  3. Department of Physics, College of Science, Shantou University, Guangdong 515063, China

Abstract
We report our work on testing the tensile strength of single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) bundles and their fatigue behavior. The strength of SWCNT bundle was tested using a testing device developed in house. From load versus time curves, we are able to interpret the strength distribution of SWCNTs. The fatigue behavior of unidirectional, aligned single-walled nanotube (SWNT) rope reinforced epoxy composite under tension-tension cyclic load was studied. Patterns of crack propagation under tension in a SWNT were also studied by molecular mechanics simulations, where defect-free SWNTs and SWNTs with two different modes of Stone-Wales defects were studied. It is demonstrated by the results of molecular simulation that the observed fracture surfaces of SWNT can be reproduced reasonably well, suggesting possible fatigue failure mechanisms of SWNT in the composite.