A study of the effects of the matrix epoxy resin and graphene oxide (GO) manufacturing process on the tensile behaviour of GO-epoxy nanocomposites

This work comprises a study of the reinforcement capacity provided by the addition of different types of nano-reinforcements of graphene oxide (GO) to epoxy matrices. A range of nanocomposites, resulting from the use of two epoxy matrices (a mono-component system and a bi-component system) and different types of GOs, at different weight percentages were studied and tensile tests were performed on specimens of these materials in order to quantify the variations in their elastic constants and tensile strength. The GO reinforcements used were obtained by means of the modified Hummers method followed by thermal reduction at different temperatures. The aim was to quantify the effect of carbon/oxygen ratio on the reinforcement capacity of GO in order to optimise the manufacturing process. The stiffness of the nanocomposites improved with the addition of TRGO for both matrices, but the tensile strength depended on the matrix.