Prediction of the elastic properties of single walled carbon nanotube reinforced polymers: A comparative study of several micromechanical models

This paper deals with the prediction of the elastic properties of polymer composites reinforced with single walled carbon nanotubes. Our main contribution is the investigation of several micromechanical models, while most of the papers on the subject deal with only one approach. We implemented four homogenization schemes, a sequential one and three others based on various extensions of the Mori-Tanaka (M-T) mean-field homogenization model: two-level (M-T/M-T), two-step (M-T/M-T) and two-step (M-T/Voigt). Several composite systems are studied, with various properties of the matrix and the graphene, short or long nanotubes, fully aligned or randomly oriented in 3D or 2D. Validation targets are experimental data or finite element results, either based on a 2D periodic unit cell or a 3D representative volume element. The comparative study showed that there are cases where all micromechanical models give adequate predictions, while for some composite materials and some properties, certain models fail in a rather spectacular fashion. It was found that the two-level (M-T/M-T) homogenization model gives the best predictions in most cases.