• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
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• 2006.05a
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• pp.197-198
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• 2006

In the solid freeform fabrication (SFF) system using selective laser sintering (SLS), polyamide-12 powder is currently recognized as general material. In this study, some kinds of polyamide-6 powders with different shape and particlesize were fabricated to investigate the formability, the microstructure and mechanical properties. Also, to develop a more elaborate and rapid system, this study employs a new SLS device with a 3-axis dynamic focusing scanner system instead of the existing fe lens used in commercial SLS. Polyamide-6 powders having the average size of 100 m were treated thermally in order to keep the spherical symmetry in shape. These polyamide-6 powders were mixed with polyamide-12 powders having the average size of 50 m to give the bimodal distribution of size. These mixed powders showed the better fabrication in the selective laser sintering process because the smaller particles of polyamide-11 played an important role in the compact packing of powders by filling the void space between the large particles of polyamide-6. Also, Experiments have performed to evaluate the effect of a scanning path and sintering parameters by fabricating the various 3D objects.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2007.05a
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• pp.1404-1409
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• 2007

Polymers for laser sintering were needed in order to fabricate the articles with the three-dimensional duplication equipment of SLS (selective laser sintering) process. The thermal properties, particle size, distribution, and shape of polymer powder had a close relation with the processibility of laser sintering. In this study, we prepared new polymer powders with uniform size and higher bulk density by wet process. Wet process consists of several finely-controlled steps such as dissolution, nucleation, propagation and crystallization. Several additives were added to improve the thermal, rheological, and flow properties.

• Carbon letters
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• v.11 no.4
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• pp.279-284
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• 2010

Graphene is one of the most promising materials for many applications. It can be used in a variety of applications not only as a reinforcement material for polymer to obtain a combination of desirable mechanical, electrical, thermal, and barrier properties in the resulting nanocomposite but also as a component in energy storage, fuel cells, solar cells, sensors, and batteries. Recent research at Michigan State University has shown that it is possible to exfoliate natural graphite into graphite nanoplatelets composed entirely of stacks of graphene. The size of the platelets can be controlled from less than 10 nm in thickness and diameters of any size from sub-micron to 15 microns or greater. In this study we have investigated the influence of melt compounding processing on the physical properties of a polyamide 6 (PA6) nanocomposite reinforced with exfoliated graphite nanoplatelets (xGnP). The morphology, electrical conductivity, and mechanical properties of xGnP-PA6 nanocomposite were characterized with electrical microscopy, X-ray diffraction, AC impedance, and mechanical properties. It was found that counter rotation (CNR) twins crew processed xGnP/PA6 nanocomposite had similar mechanical properties with co-rotation (CoR) twin screw processed or with CoR conducted with a screw design modified for nanoparticles (MCoR). Microscopy showed that the CNR processed nanocomposite had better xGnP dispersion than the (CoR) twin screw processed and modified screw (MCoR) processed ones. It was also found that the CNR processed nanocomposite at a given xGnP content showed the lowest graphite X-ray diffraction peak at $26.5^{\circ}$ indicating better xGnP dispersion in the nanocomposite. In addition, it was also found that the electrical conductivity of the CNR processed 12 wt.% xGnP-PA6 nanocomposite is more than ten times higher than the CoR and MCoR processed ones. These results indicate that better dispersion of an xGnP-PA6 nanocomposite is attainable in CNR twins crew processing than conventional CoR processing.