Development of novel TGDDM epoxy nanocomposites for aerospace and high performance applications – Study of their thermal and electrical behaviour

The present work focuses on a study of the thermal and electrical behaviour of pure N,N′-tetraglycidyl diaminodiphenylmethane (TGDDM) for use in aerospace, high performance applications. The synthesis of the tetraglycidyl epoxies was done and they were characterized by FT-IR (Fourier transform infrared spectra) and Nuclear magnetic resonance spectra (1H NMR and 13C NMR). Nanoclay and POSS-amine nanoreinforcements denoted as N1 and N2 were incorporated into the synthesized epoxy resins. Curing was done with diaminodiphenylmethane (DDM) and bis(3-aminophenyl)phenylphosphine oxide (BAPPO) curing agents denoted as X and Y, respectively. The thermal behaviour of the tetraglycidyl resins and their corresponding nanocomposites was studied by thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The electrical behaviour namely dielectric strength, comparative tracking index (CTI), volume resistivity, surface resistivity and arc resistance of the nanocomposites was also studied and the interesting results obtained are discussed.