Investigation of the Mechanical Properties of Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene (ABS)-Nanosilica Reinforced Nanocomposites for Fused Filament Fabrication 3D Printing

Abstract

To expand the capabilities of 3D printed structures generated from commercial thermoplastic printers, this paper presents the fabrication of polymer filaments that contain inorganic nanoparticles. Nanosilica was dispersed ultrasonically into acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) and extruded into filaments for fused filament fabrication (FFF) 3D printing. The produced filaments had nanosilica compositions of 5% and 10%wt. A dynamic ultra-micro hardness tester was used in order to characterize the mechanical behavior of the filaments. Also, 3D printed tensile specimens were used to obtain the strain-strain curves and monitor the tensile strength of such structures. The morphology of the nanosilica/ABS composite was studied with a scanning electron microscope (SEM). The results from the dynamic ultra-micro hardness tester reveal that the incorporation of nanosilica particles increases the stiffness and hardness of the ABS material especially in the case of 10%wt concentration. However, for such concentration 3D printing was not possible due to the severe embrittlement of the material. 3D printed structures produced in the form of tensile specimens from the 5%wt nanocomposites display a higher breaking point stress and stiffness than those printed from the pure ABS polymer.