The high mechanical and thermal performance of poly p-phenylene-2, 6-benzobisoxazole(PBO) fiber provides great potential applications as reinforcement fibers for composites. A composite of PBO fiber and epoxy resin has excellent electrical insulation properties, therefore, it is considered to be the best choice for the reinforcement in high magnetic field coils for pulsed magnetic fields up to 100 T. However, poor adhesion between PBO fiber and matrix is found because of the chemically inactive and/or relatively smooth surface of the reinforcement fiber preventing efficient chemical bonding in the interface, which is a challenging issue to improve mechanical properties. Here, we report the surface modification of PBO fibers by ultraviolet (UV) irradiation, O2 and NH3 plasma, as well as acidic treatments. The interfacial adhesion strength values of all the treatments show the similar level as determined for aramid fibers by pull-out tests, a significant impact on fiber-matrix-adhesion was not achieved. The surface free energy and roughness are increased for both sized and extracted fibers after plasma treatments together with maleic anhydride grafting. The sized fiber shows marginal improvement in adhesion strength and no change in fiber tensile strength because of the barrier effect of the finish. For the extracted fiber, different surface treatments either show no apparent effect or cause reduction in adhesion strength. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) topography analysis of the fracture surfaces proved adhesive failure at the fiber surface. The fiber surface roughness is increased and more surface flaws are induced, which could result in coarse interface structures when the treated fiber surface has no adequate wetting and functional groups. The adhesion failure is further confirmed by similar adhesion strength and compression shear strength values when the fiber was embedded in various epoxy resins with different temperature behavior. The tensile strength of fiber is sensitive to surface treatment conditions as revealed by a bimodal Weibull statistical distribution analysis. Considerable strength reduction occurred, particularly for cases of acidic and plasma treatments, while UV irradiation shows the better ability to retain fiber strength.
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