INFLUENCE OF AN ELECTRIC FIELD ON THE HARDENING PROCESS AND THE PROPERTIES OF AN EPOXY COMPOSITE DISCRETELY REINFORCED WITH PHOSPHOCARBON FIBERS
V. I. Dubkova and N. P. Krut'ko UDC 534.143:678.643 The influence of an electric field on the hardening process, the structure, and the properties of an epoxy composite in the presence of a phosphorus-containing carbon filler has been investigated. It has been shown that under the action of an electric field the process of formation of a three-dimensional epoxy polymer in the presence in the system of phosphocarbon fibers proceeds more intensively with the formation of a more rigidly bound structure of the polymer as compared to the same composition hardened in the absence of the field. It has been established that the fibrous filler-binder interface has a dominant role in the formation of a spatially cross-linked polymer and in the properties of the product hardened both under the action of the electric field and without it. Institute of General and Inorganic Chemistry, National Academy of Sciences of Belarus, 9 Surganov Str., Minsk, 220072, Belarus; email: dubkova@igic.bas-net.by. Translated from Inzhenerno-Fizicheskii Zhurnal, Vol. 80, No. 3, pp. 47-54, May-June, 2007. Original article submitted October 19, 2005.