Interfacial component of glass fiber in ternary composites of GF/PC/PP: effect of the preferential encapsulation of glass fiber

We investigated the encapsulation phenomena of glass fibers for a ternary c omposite system of glass fiber, polycarbonate and polypropylene by impregna ting fibers with a selected resin using a newly developed process. On the b asis of our observations of the morphology and mechanical properties, we re port that viscosity ratio may very likely play an important role in the fin al interfacial structure of this system and that the improved wetting of fi bers by preferential encapsulation would be a good approach in cases where the combinations of the resins or processing conditions lead to the similar relative melt viscosity of the component resins. (C) 2000 Published by Els evier Science Ltd.