Due to their high specific stiffness and strength, carbon fiber reinforced plastics (CFRPs) are widely employed in aviation and automobile industry. Fabrication of automobile body parts, military and sports equipment, and aerospace components are the major application areas of CFRP composites. To develop even better composite materials carbon nanotubes (CNTs) have been grown directly on the surface of carbon fibers using chemical vapor deposition (CVD) technique. Mechanical testing on single fiber composites as well as laminated composites are carried out to evaluate the effect of synthesized nanotubes on the interfacial strength, wettability, bending response, tensile response, interlaminar strength, and fracture strength of CFRPs. 

Related Publications:

1. Harpreet Bedi, Srikant Padhee and Prabhat K Agnihotri,“Effect of CNT grafting on the wettability and average mechanical properties of carbon fiber/polymer multiscale composites”,Polymer Composites, 39 (2018), E1184-E1195.

2. Sorab Khan, Harpreet Singh Bedi and Prabhat K Agnihotri, “Augmenting mode-II fracture toughness of carbon fiber/epoxy composites through carbon nanotube grafting”,Engineering Fracture Mechanics 204 (2018), 211-220.

3. Harpreet Bedi, Srikant Padhee and Prabhat K Agnihotri,“On the nature of interface of carbon nanotube coated carbon fibers with different polymers”, Materials Science and Engineering,139 (2016), 012014.