Comparative study of fullerenes and graphene nanoplatelets on the mechanical and thermomechanical properties of poly(ether ether ketone)

Poly(ether ether ketone) (PEEK) is a high-performance engineering plastics, being widely used in aerospace, automobile and biomedical applications. In this work, the effect of fullerenes (C-60) and graphene nanoplatelets (GNP) on the properties of PEEK was compared. It was found that both C-60 and GNP enhanced the modulus of PEEK significantly and the reinforcing effect was more pronounced for C-60. Most interestingly, the tan delta peak height of PEEK kept constant irrespective of the addition of C-60, while it decreased gradually with increasing the content of GNP. This study suggests that C-60 appears to be the best filler of PEEK if the damping property of the materials is a critical concern. (C) 2019 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.