• Composites Research
• /
• v.26 no.5
• /
• pp.309-314
• /
• 2013

Highly ablation resistant carbon nanotube (CNT)-phenolic composites were fabricated by the addition of low concentrations of CNT nanofiller. Tensile and compressive properties as well as ablative resistance were significantly improved by the addition of only 0.1 and 0.3 wt% of uniformly dispersed CNTs. An oxygen-kerosene-flame torch and a field emission scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM) were used to evaluate the ablative properties and microstructures of these CNT-phenolic composites. Thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA) revealed that the ablation rate was lower for the 0.3 wt% CNT-phenolic composites than for neat phenolic or the composite with 0.1 wt% CNT. Ablative mechanisms for all three materials were investigated using this TGA in conjunction with microstructural studies using a FE-SEM. The microstructural studies revealed that CNT acted as an ablation resistant phase at high temperatures, and that the uniformity of dispersion of the CNT played an important role in this resistance to ablation.

• Computers and Concrete
• /
• v.10 no.2
• /
• pp.135-147
• /
• 2012

At mesoscale, concrete is considered as a three-phase composite material consisting of the aggregate particles, the cement matrix and the interfacial transition zone (ITZ). The reconstruction of the internal structures for concrete composites requires the identification of the boundary of the aggregate particles and the cement matrix using digital imaging technology followed by post-processing through MATLAB. A parameter study covers the subsection transformation, median filter, and open and close operation of the digital image sample to obtain the optimal parameter for performing the image processing technology. The subsection transformation is performed using a grey histogram of the digital image samples with a threshold value of [120, 210] followed by median filtering with a $16{\times}16$ square module based on the dimensions of the aggregate particles and their internal impurity. We then select a "disk" tectonic structure with a specific radius, which performs open and close operations on the images. The edges of the aggregate particles (similar to the original digital images) are obtained using the canny edge detection method. The finite element model at mesoscale can be established using the proposed image processing technology. The location of the crack determined through the numerical method is identical to the experimental result, and the load-displacement curve determined through the numerical method is in close agreement with the experimental results. Comparisons of the numerical and experimental results show that the proposed image processing technology is highly effective in reconstructing the internal structures of concrete composites.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
• /
• v.42 no.8 s.279
• /
• pp.582-587
• /
• 2005

AlN-BN ceramic composites were fabricated and their mechanical properties were investigated. The relative density of hot-pressed composites decreased with increasing BN content, but over $99\%$ could be obtained with 30 $vol\%$ BN in AlN. YAG was formed in the composites and monolithic AlN as a second phase by the reaction between $Y_2O_3$, added as sintering aid, and $Al_2O_3$. As expected, Vickers hardness and Young's modulus decreased with increasing BN content. The three-point flexural strength also showed similar behavior decreasing from 500 MPa of monolith down to 250 MPa by the addition 30 $vol\%$ BN. However, interestingly, the standard deviation of the strength values decreased significantly as BN was added to AlN. As a result, the Weibull modulus of the AlN-30 $vol\% BN composite was 21.3, which was extremely high. Fractography and crack path studies revealed that BN platelets induced grain pull-out and crack bridging in a bigger scale during crack propagation. Consequently, fracture toughness increased as more BN was added, reaching 4.5 $MPa\sqrt{m}$ at 40 $vol\%$ BN.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
• /
• v.19 no.3
• /
• pp.142-150
• /
• 2009

In this paper, non-treated ACF (Activated Carbon Fiber) /$TiO_2$ and Zn-treated ACF/$TiO_2$ were prepared. The prepared composites were characterized in terms of their structural crystallinity, elemental identification and photocatalytic activity. XRD patterns of the composites showed that the non-treated ACF/$TiO_2$ composite contained only typical single and clear anatase forms while the Zn-treated ACF/$TiO_2$ contained a mixed anatase and rutile phase with a unique ZnO peak. SEM results show that the titanium complex particles are uniformly distributed on and around the fiber and that the titanium complex particles are more regularly distributed on and around the ACF surfaces upon an increase of the $ZnCl_2$ concentration. These EDX spectra show the presence of peaks from the C, O and Ti elements. Moreover, peaks of the Zn element were observed in the Zn-treated ACF/$TiO_2$ composites. The prominent photocatalytic activity of the Zn-treated ACF/$TiO_2$ can be attributed to the three different effects of photo-degradation: doping, absorptivity by an electron transfer, and adsorptivity of porous ACFs between the Zn-$TiO_2$ and Zn-ACF.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
• /
• v.26 no.3
• /
• pp.336-340
• /
• 2015

Three different types of polycarbonate (PC)/graphene oxide (GO) composites using diphenyl carbonate as a monomer were fabricated by melt polymerization. Those were the PC/GO composite (PC/GO) using a twin extruder, in-situ PC/GO composite (PC/GO-cat.) using a catalyst, and in-situ PC/GO composite (PC/GO-COCl) using a GO-COCl treated by -COCl, Chemical structures of the composites were confirmed by C-H and C=O stretching peak at $3000cm^{-1}$ and $1750cm^{-1}$, respectively. The slope for the storage (G') versus loss (G") modulus plot decreased with an increase in the heterogeneous property of polymer melts. So we can check the GO dispersion of the PC/GO composites using by the slop for G'-G" plot. According to the G'- G" slopes for three different types of PC/GO composites, GO was well dispersed within PC matrix in case of PC/GO and PC/GO-cat.. It was also confirmed by atomic force microscope (AFM) photos. One of the reasons for the poor GO dispersion of PC/GO-COCl is branching and crosslinking processes occurred during polymerization, which was further confirmed by a plot for the complex modulus versus phase difference.

• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
• /
• v.46 no.3
• /
• pp.263-270
• /
• 2009

The effect of photoelectrocatalytic (PEC) degradation for different dyes with the CNT/$TiO_2$ electrode was studied. The prepared electrode was characterized with surface properties, structural crystallinity, elemental identification, and PEC activity. The $N_2$ adsorption data showed that the composites had decreased surface area compared with the pristine CNT. This indicated the blocking of micropores on the surface of CNT, which was further supported by observation via FESEM. XRD patterns of the composites showed that the CNT/$TiO_2$ composite contained a mixing anatase and rutile phase. EDX spectra showed the presence of C, O and Ti peaks for all samples. The decomposition efifciency of the prepared electrode was evaluated by the PEC degradation of three dyes (methylene blue (MB), rhodamine B (RH.B), methyl orange (MO)). The variations of the FT-IR spectra and pH value of dye solutions were measured during the PEC system; it was found that the CNT/$TiO_2$ electrode has better PEC degradation for MB solution than that of RH.B and MO. The proposed degradation mechanism was present.

• Composites Research
• /
• v.30 no.2
• /
• pp.77-83
• /
• 2017

Liquid silicon infiltration, which is one of the methods of producing fiber reinforced ceramic composites, has several advantages such as low fabrication cost and good shape formability. In order to confirm LSI process feasibility of SiC fiber, $SiC_f/SiC$ composites were fabricated using three types of SiC fibers (Tyranno SA, LoxM, Tyranno S) which have different crystallinity and oxygen content. Composites that were fabricated with LSI process were well densified by less than 2% of porosity, but showed an obvious difference in 3-point bending strength according to crystallinity and oxygen content. When composites in LSI process was exposed to a high temperature, crystallization and micro structural changes were occurred in amorphous SiOC phase in SiC fiber. Fiber shrinkage also observed during LSI process that caused from reaction in fiber and between fiber and matrix. These were confirmed with changes of process temperature by SEM, XRD and TEM analysis.

• Journal of the Computational Structural Engineering Institute of Korea
• /
• v.36 no.5
• /
• pp.323-330
• /
• 2023

The development of an analysis model that reflects the microstructure characteristics of polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) fiber-reinforced cementitious composites, which have a highly complex microstructure, enables synergy between efficient material design and real experiments. PVA fiber orientations are an important factor that influences the mechanical behavior of PVA fiber-reinforced cementitious composites. Owing to the difficulty in distinguishing the gray level value obtained from micro-CT images of PVA fibers from adjacent phases, fiber segmentation is time-consuming work. In this study, a micro-CT test with a voxel size of 0.65 ㎛³ was performed to investigate the three-dimensional distribution of fibers. To segment the fibers and generate training data, histogram, morphology, and gradient-based phase-segmentation methods were used. A U-net model was proposed to segment fibers from micro-CT images of PVA fiber-reinforced cementitious composites. Data augmentation was applied to increase the accuracy of the training, using a total of 1024 images as training data. The performance of the model was evaluated using accuracy, precision, recall, and F1 score. The trained model achieved a high fiber segmentation performance and efficiency, and the approach can be applied to other specimens as well.

• Proceedings of the Korea Committee for Ocean Resources and Engineering Conference
• /
• 2004.11a
• /
• pp.266-270
• /
• 2004

SiC materials have been extensively studied for high temperature components in advanced energy system and advanced gas turbine because it has excellent high temperature strength, low coefficient of thermal expansion, good resistance to oxidation and good thermal and chemical stability etc. However, the brittle characteristics of SiC such as low fracture toughness and low strain-to fracture still impose a severe limitation on practical applications of SiC materials. For these reasons, SiC/SiC composites can be considered as a promising for various structural materials, because of their good fracture toughness compared with monolithic SiC ceramics. But, high temperature and pressure lead to the degradation of the reinforcing jiber during the hot pressing. Therefore, reduction of sintering temperature and pressure is key requirements for the fabrication of SiC/SiC composites by hot pressing method. In the present work, monolithic Liquid Phase Sintered SiC (LPS-SiC) was fabricated by hot pressing method in Ar atmosphere at $1800^{\circ}C$ under 20MPa using $Al_2O_3,\;Y_2O_3\;and\;SiO_2$ as sintering additives in order to low sintering temperature and sintering pressure. The starting powder was high purity $\beta-SiC$ nano-powder with all average particle size of 30mm. The characterization of LPS-SiC was investigated by means of SEM and three point bending test. Base on the composition of sintering additives-, microstructure- and mechanical property correlation, tire compositions of sintering additives are discussed.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
• /
• v.20 no.4
• /
• pp.228-234
• /
• 2010

In this paper, Fe-$TiO_2$ and Fe-fullerene/$TiO_2$ composite photocatalysts were prepared with titanium (IV) n-butoxide (TNB) by a sol-gel method. $TiO_2$, Fe-$TiO_2$ and Fe-fullerene/$TiO_2$ were characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Transmission electron microscope (TEM), specific surface area (BET), X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD) and energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX). The photocatalytic activities were evaluated by the photocatalytic oxidation of methylene blue (MB) solution. XRD patterns of the composites showed that the photocatalyst composite contained a typical single and clear anatase phase. The surface properties shown by SEM presented a characterization of the texture on Fe-fullerene/$TiO_2$ composites and showed a homogenous composition in the particles for the titanium sources used. The EDX spectra for the elemental identification showed the presence of O, C and Ti elements. Moreover, peaks of the Fe element were observed in the Fe-$TiO_2$ and Fe-fullerene/$TiO_2$ composites. The degradation of MB solution by UV-light irradiation in the presence of photocatalyst compounds was investigated in complete darkness. The degradation of MB concentration in aqueous solution occurred via three kinds of physical phenomena: quantum efficiency of the fullerene; organo-metallic reaction of the Fe compound; and decomposition of $TiO_2$. The degradation rate of the methylene blue solution increased when using Fe-fullerene/$TiO_2$ compounds.