Mechanical treatment as highly effective method of physico-chemical properties control of carbon black

Abstract Commercial carbon black (CB) was mechanically activated in air for 5–60 min and 100 g acceleration of milling bodies, which were represented by steel balls with the diameter of 2, 5 and 8 mm. Changes in the composition and structure of the tested objects, including their surface layers, were considered. IR spectroscopy and acid-base titration showed that mechanical activation (MA) of CB results in the formation of oxygen-containing surface functional groups in the amount of 0.21–0.34 mEq/g. The analysis of the pore texture of mechanically activated CB samples revealed that an increase in MA intensity increases the specific surface area and decreases the total pore volume. The high intensity of MA leads to the formation of the pore system in CB that differs from the initial system and consists of 10–100 nm pores and thin pores with the size of 3–5 nm. A TEM study on the morphology of mechanically activated CB samples demonstrated that activation at the high intensity results in the partial destruction of globules and the appearance of small particles with the size of 2–5 nm. A structural study showed that mechanical activation at the high intensity may lead to rearrangement of graphene layers in globules.