Experimental Study on the Water Absorption and Tribological Properties of PA6/CaCO3 Nanocomposites

In this paper, we investigate the effect of nano-CaCO3 on water absorption and tribological properties of polyamide-6. To this end, nanocomposites based on polyamide-6 blend, containing 1 to 5 phr of nano-CaCO3, and 1 phr of maleated polyamide (PA-g-MAH) as compatibilizer, are prepared via melt compounding followed by injection molding. The wear testing of each of the prototypes is carried out under identical conditions. Then, the morphology is studied using scanning electron microscopy. The addition of nano-CaCO3 particles with compatibilizer increases the wear resistance and reduces the water absorption. The results of experiments indicate that minimum wear rate is achieved by adding 1 phr of nano-CaCO3 with compatibilizer which is nearly 4 times less than pure PA6. Furthermore, the presence of nano-CaCO3 together with PA-g-MAH lowers the amount of water absorption as high as 32% wt in compare to pure PA6. In addition to these, this fact is also emerged that effect of compatibilizer is prominent on uniform distribution of the nano-CaCO3 particles among polyamide matrix that it leads to improve the tribological properties of the nanocomposite prototypes in the wear test.