LAUSR

Abstract The attainment of both strength and toughness was crucial for polymer composites. However, compared with the long fiber composites, conventional short fiber composites showed the low strength and toughness, due to the more stress concentrations generated around the fiber ends. In this work, a new morphological short carbon fiber reinforcement was fabricated by electrodeposition, which presented like the dendritic structure. The enhanced strength and toughness were realized by incorporating the dendritic short carbon fibers into rigid polyurethane (RPU) matrix. The tensile strength, impact strength and interfacial shear strength (ILSS) of the dendritic short carbon fibers/RPU composites were increased by 41.3%, 81.2% and 28.9%, respectively compared with pure RPU. The composites also exhibited the excellent dynamic mechanical properties. The satisfactory performance was mainly attributed to the pinning effect by the dendritic structure.