Effect of different doses of electron beam irradiation on the structure of PAN precursor fibers and resultant stabilized fibers

Different doses of electron beam was imposed on the polyacrylonitrile(PAN) precursor fibers before the fibers were stabilized. The effect of electron beam irradiation on the chemical structure, crystallite size of PAN precursor fibers and density, oxygen content, transverse section morphology of the stabilized fibers in the stabilization process were characterized by the use of fourier transform infrared spectroscopy(FTIR), float-sink procedure, elemental analysis and scanning electron microscope(SEM), respectively. The results showed that the extent of cyclization was increased and the crystallite size was decreased. We found that electron beam irradiation could accelerate the cyclization reaction and stabilization reaction in the stabilization process through density test and elemental analysis. We also found that the effect of 200 kGy electron beam irradiated fibers with the stabilization time of 75 min was better than that of the original stabilized fibers with 90 min. These results demonstrate that electron beam irradiation can shorten the stabilization time.