Physical and Mechanical Properties of Nickel Coated Carbon Fibers and Their Fabricated Composites

Nickel coated carbon fibers are a well characterized staple of conductive plastics and conductive composites. When carbon fibers are coated with nickel, the traditional physical and mechanical weight specific properties of both the fiber and the resulting composite are largely preserved, while the nickel coating provides for engineered electrical properties in the composite. Due to the dense nature of the nickel, and the poor reactivity of nickel with carbon, the preservation of these properties may initially seem counterintuitive. It will be shown herein that the thin, uniform, cohesive and ductile coating of the naturally high modulus nickel acts in concert to preserve these mechanical properties.