Mechanical characteristics of nanocomposite materials based on polytrifluorochloroethylene

In this work, elastic and strength properties of polymer composites with a polytrifluorochloroethylene matrix and expanded graphite (EG) filler have been evaluated using the microindentation method. The influence of the filler dispersion and concentration on the mechanical characteristics of the nanocomposite materials (NCM) has been studied. It has been established that the microhardness of the NCM decreases with increasing the filler concentration. An increase in the filler particles sizes of NCM with a filler concentration of 3 vol.% led to an increase of microhardness and Young's modulus. As for NCM with 10 vol.% of the filler, an increase in the EG particles size up to 180 μm showed a similar change in the mechanical characteristics. However, a further increase in the EGs average particle size caused a decrease in Young's modulus and the microhardness of the nanocomposites. The reason for that might be a different degree of the polymer structuring and the formation of different orientational ordering of the filler nanoparticles.