Polyethylene fiber drawing optimization

Polymer fiber drawing creates fibers with enhanced thermal conductivity and strength compared to bulk polymer because drawing aligns the molecular chains. I optimize the polymer fiber drawing method in order to achieve polymer fibers that are drawn to lengths exceeding 1cm and develop a method to cut and store them for future experimental purposes. With lengths exceeding 1cm, starting with lengths near 0.5mm, these fibers undergo very large tensile deformations. This ensures the fibers obtained have been ultra drawn, and the polymer chains have aligned, thus enhancing the tensile strength and thermal conductivity of the fiber. By storing these fibers, I can perform experimental measurements in the future to obtain thermal conductivity values for polyethylene fibers and notice the effect of aligning the molecular chains.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Mechanical Engineering.

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2011

Author dc:creator

• Chiloyan, Vazrik

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Gang Chen.

• Mechanical Engineering.

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/68829

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/68829