Fiber breakage and dispersion in carbon-fiber-reinforced nylon 6/Clay nanocomposites

In this paper, short carbon-fiber-reinforced nylon 6/clay nanocomposites are prepared via melt compounding, and fiber breakage and dispersion during processing are studied. The influences of clay and processing conditions on fiber breakage and dispersion are taken into consideration. It is found that the presence of organoclay can improve fiber dispersion, which is due to dispersion at the nanoscale of exfoliated clay sheets with large aspect ratio. The bimodal distribution of fiber length is observed in fiber-reinforced nanocomposites, which is similar to that in conventional fiber-reinforced composites. The improvement of fiber breakage at moderate organoclay loadings is also observed, which is ascribed to the rheological and lubricating effects induced by organoclay. (C) 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.