Mechanical and dielectric properties and crystalline behavior of multilayer graphite-filled polyethylene composites

As one of the duplicated cases of ultrathin polymer films, multilayer graphite/polymer composites are of great interests in various applications. Graphite/polyethylene (PE) composites with various layer numbers and graphite particle sizes were prepared by lamination. The mechanical and dielectric properties and crystalline behavior of the composites were investigated by scanning electron microscopy, differential scanning calorimetry, tensile test, and dielectric strength test. With the same amount of graphite addition, the tensile strength of the composites increases with decreasing layer thickness, but decreases with increasing graphite particle size. The longitudinal tensile strength is greater than the transverse one. The tensile strength of the 3(6)-layer composites with a particle size of 15 mu m has enhancements of 34.76 and 68.39% in the longitudinal and transverse directions compared with that of the single-layer pure PE film. The dielectric constant of the composites nonlinearly increases with decreasing layer thickness, while the dielectric loss is independent of this factor. The dielectric constant of the 3(6)-layer composites with a particle size of 15 mu m is about two times as large as that of the single-layer pure PE film. The crystalline peak temperature and the crystallinity of the composites increase with the decrease in layer thickness. Coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulations were also carried out to understand the experimental observations by getting an insight into the microstructure of the multilayer composites. This work would be helpful for the production of optimized of multilayer graphite/polymer composites by lamination for electric energy storage. (c) 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019, 136, 48131.