Curing behavior studies of phenol-containing phthalonitrile monomer for advanced composite materials

Phenol-containing phthalonitrile polymer is a novel type of autocatalytic phthalonitrile thermoset with outstanding thermal performance. In this work, the curing behavior of phenol-containing phthalonitrile monomer was studied by differential scanning calorimetry. Based on the isoconversional principle, the activation energy was calculated as 63±6 kJ/mol. It is significantly lower than the reported that of phenol catalyzed, indicating a strong reactivity of phenol-containing phthalonitrile monomer. Additionally, the reaction model was judged to be autocatalytic and the remaining kinetic parameters were calculated by linear regression method. By comparing the experimental data with the kinetic mathematic model, the accuracy of the curing kinetic equation was verified. Moreover, the curing kinetic equation was adopted to predict the curing time for phenol-containing phthalonitrile polymer to fully solidify under a constant temperature, which is of great significance for the application of phenol-containing phthalonitrile polymer.