Graphene nanoplatelet, multiwall carbon nanotube, and hybrid multiwall carbon nanotube-graphene nanoplatelet epoxy nanocomposites as strain sensing coatings

Strain monitoring is of great interest in order to check components structural life, to prevent catastrophic failures, and, possibly, to predict residual life in case of unexpected events. In this study, strain sensing epoxy-based coatings containing carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs), graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs), and a mix of the two (MWCNT+GNP) have been produced, with the same initial electrical resistivity, and applied on glass fiber reinforced composites. Morphological, mechanical, and electrical tests have been then performed evaluating the resistance variation and the strain sensing performance of the sensors. A theoretical model to relate the resulting gauge factors to the different types of nanofillers has been applied. The results showed that all systems present a strain sensing performance with different gauge factors (and hence sensitivity) at low strain: GNP samples showed the highest gauge factor (10.3), MWCNT samples the lowest (1.5), and the mixed system lies in the middle (4.3). From analytical analysis, the value of initial distance among conductive particles was found to be 0.3 nm in the case of MWCNT and 1.2 nm for GNP, explaining why the gauge factors of the produced sensors are different.