Comparative Study on Toughening Effect of PTS and PTK in Various Epoxy Resins

Abstract

This study investigated the toughening effect of in situ polytriazoleketone (PTK) and polytriazolesulfone (PTS) toughening agent when applied to various epoxy resins, such as diglycidyl ether of bisphenol A (DGEBA), diglycidyl ether of bisphenol F (DGEBF), and triglycidyl p-aminophenol (TGAP) with 3,3′-diaminodiphenylsulfone as a curing agent. The fracture toughness, tensile properties, and thermal properties of the prepared epoxy samples were evaluated and compared. When PTK was mixed with DGEBF, the fracture toughness was improved by 27% with 8.6% increased tensile strength compared to the untoughened DGEBF. When PTS was mixed with TGAP, the fracture toughness was improved by 51% without decreasing tensile properties compared to the untoughened TGAP. However, when PTK or PTS was mixed with other epoxy resins, the fracture toughness decreased or improved with decreasing tensile properties. This is attributed to the poor miscibility between the solid-state monomer of PTK (4,4′-bis(propynyloxy)benzophenone (PBP)) or PTS (4,4′-sulfonylbis(propynyloxy)benzene (SPB)) and the epoxy resin, resulting in the polymerization of low molecular weight PTK or PTS in epoxy resin. Therefore, the toughening effect of PTK or PTS can be maximized by the appropriate selection of epoxy resin based on the miscibility between PBP or SPB and the resin.

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“…The introduction of a thermoplastic HEMA into the microstructure somewhat hindered the cross-linking of epoxy during curing and the molecular chains of HEMA started to move locally at lower temperature. Minor or shoulder peaks may appear due to the phase separation between the epoxy resin and the toughening agent or inhomogeneous crosslinking density [ 14 ]. However, all specimens demonstrated the T g peak at higher temperature around 78.77~90.26 °C, which reflected the movement of the molecular chains in the microstructural regions unaffected by the HEMA.…”

“…Sometimes, the addition of toughener could create non-uniform phase separation and crosslinking density. In the work by Kwon and coworkers [ 14 ], the appearance of additional side peak in the tanδ of a viscoelastic measurement on the polytriazoleketone (PTK) and polytriazolesulfone (PTS) toughened epoxy resin demonstrated the probable concern.…”