Mechanical properties of short fiber reinforced thermoplastic blends

An immiscible thermoplastic component was added to a conventional short fiber reinforced polymer to study its effect on the mechanical properties of the composite. Because of the preferential wetting of the fiber reinforcement a continuous network was formed of fibers 'welded' together by the minor component within the matrix polymer. Polyethylene (PE) was used as the matrix, polyamide-6 (PA6) as dispersed polymer phase and glass fibers (GF) as reinforcement. The obtained composite retained unusually high values of the elasticity modulus at temperatures above the melting point of the matrix. The upper limit of the 'applicability' of the material is determined by the melting point of the minor component. A simple model was derived to describe the mechanical properties of the composite. The model shows a good agreement with the experimental data. The influence of the model parameters on the predictions of the model was examined. © 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.