Jet-Injection In Situ Production of PVDF/PCM Composite Fibers for Thermal Management

Abstract

Thermal management protects against external agents and increases the lifetime and performance of the devices in which it is implemented. Because of their ability to store and release a high amount of energy at a nearly constant temperature, phase change materials (PCMs) are promising thermoregulatory materials. Thus, the manufacture of PVDF fibers containing PCMs has advantages since PVDF is already used in elements that are susceptible to thermal management as a binder in batteries or as a base material for fabrics. This work presents a simple, versatile, in situ, cost-effective, and easy-to-scale-up method to produce PVDF-based fibers containing paraffin RT-28HC for thermal management. To achieve that goal, the microfluidic approach of coaxial flows was simplified to gravity-aided laminar jet injection into a bulk fluid, where fibers were produced by the solvent extraction mechanism. With this methodology, hollow PVDF fibers and core-shell PVDF fibers containing paraffin RT-28HC have been produced. The proposed approach resulted in fibers with up to 98 J/g of latent heat, with a hierarchical porous structure. SEM study of the fiber morphology has shown that PCM is in the form of slugs along the fibers. Such PCM distribution is maintained until the first melting cycle, when molten PCM spreads within the fiber under capillary forces, which was observed by an infrared camera. Manufactured composite fibers have shown low thermal conductivity and high elasticity, which suggest their potential application as a thermal insulation material with thermal buffer properties. Leakage tests revealed outstanding retention capacity with only 3.5% mass loss after 1000 melting/crystallization cycles. Finally, tensile tests were carried out to evaluate the mechanical properties of the fibers before and after thermal cycling.