Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
Archives of Civil and Mechanical Engineering, cilt.25, sa.4, 2025 (SCI-Expanded, Scopus)
This study aims to develop and evaluate conductive smart composite sponges (CSs) that integrate shear thickening fluids (STFs) and shear stiffening polymers (SSPs) with carbon nanotubes (CNTs) for multifunctional energy absorption (EA) applications. Rheological tests revealed that the shear thickening (ST) range of STF increased with CNT content, significantly enhancing the mechanical performance of SSP. Microstructural analysis revealed a uniform dispersion of CNTs in both the STF and SSP matrices. Electrical conductivity tests indicated that the percolation threshold for pure suspensions (STF-CNT and SSP-CNT) was lower than that for impregnated sponges (CS-STF-CNT and CS-SSP-CNT), suggesting that CNTs could form conductive networks at lower concentrations in suspensions due to reduced path length and higher mobility. Quasi-static compressive tests revealed that incorporating STF and SSP into the sponge enhanced its compressive strength, while the addition of CNTs significantly improved it. Dynamic impact tests, including force–time curves, peak reaction force (PRF), and EA improvement, consistently indicated that SSP and CNTs significantly enhanced the composites’ energy dissipation compared to other prepared samples. In particular, CS-SSP-CNT exhibits the best performance, absorbing nearly 70% of the impact energy and achieving a 95% improvement in EA. These findings make the designed CSs promising candidates for certain engineering applications that require superior energy dissipation.