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Abstract

Aerogel reinforced epoxy nanocomposite are known as efficient materials in a broad range of high performance application in many industries including aviation and marine industries. This paper investigated on the effect of stirring speed and time, as separate factors on water absorption performance silica aerogel/epoxy nanocomposite. Silica aerogel/epoxy nanocomposites were prepared variously by mixing silica powder, epoxy resin and hardener at a fixed ratio. The uncured solutions of aerogel/epoxy were then subjected to different combination of parameters of stirring speeds and stirring times. Resulted weight gained from water absorption analysis of the cured aerogel/epoxy nanocomposite was recorded at various time intervals up to 99 days. Presence of trapped air bubbles during fabrication of silica aerogel/epoxy nanocomposite was examined morphologically under Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM). Fickian diffusion analysis was used to predict water uptake by the epoxy nanocomposites. Results showed that blank epoxy stirred at higher speed and lower time exhibit the lowest rate of water absorption with only 7.30%. As for the epoxy filled nanocomposite samples, they obtained higher rate of water absorption approximately more than 9.10% compared to blank epoxy. For mix 1 (silica and epoxy resin), lower stirring speed and higher stirring time provided good result. For mix 2 (mix 1 and hardener), higher stirring speed and lower stirring time provided good result. It can be indicated that water absorption rate were influenced by stirring speed, time and adding of filler.