The effect of shear on mechanical properties and orientation of HDPE/mica composites obtained via dynamic packing injection molding (DPIM)

The interfacial interaction and orientation of filler play important roles in the enhancement of mechanical performances for polymer/inorganic filler composites. Shear has been found to be a very effective way for the enhancement of interfacial interaction and orientation. In this work, we will report our recent efforts on exploring the development of microstructure of high density polyethylene (HDPE)/mica composites in the injection-molded bars obtained by so-called dynamic packing injection molding (DPIM), which imposed oscillatory shear on the melt during the solidification stage. The mechanical properties were evaluated by tensile testing and dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA), and the crystal morphology, orientation, and the dispersion of mica were characterized by scanning electron microscopy and two-dimensional wide-angle X-ray scattering. Compared with conventional injection molding, DPIM caused an obvious increase in orientation for both HDPE and mica. More importantly, better dispersion and epitaxial crystallization of HDPE was observed on the edge of the mica in the injection-molded bar. As a result, increased tensile strength and modulus were obtained, accompanied with a decrease of elongation at break. The obtained data were treated by Halpin–Tsai model, and it turned out that this model could be also used to predict the stiffness of oriented polymer/filler composites. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.