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.
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