Abstract
In epoxy/Al laminated composites, the interface between polymers and metals plays the role of load transfer from epoxy to Al. However, the interfacial bonding between epoxy and aluminum tends to be weak. In this paper, in order to improve the interfacial strength the dendrimer layer—poly (amido amine) (PAMAM) was used to realize the amino functionalization of the interface of epoxy/Al laminated composites. The amino functionalization was tuned by controlling the hydroxyl group concentration through different Al surface treatments. The results show the interfacial adhesion strength between aluminum and epoxy was highly dependent of amino group content. The adhesion strength of epoxy/Al interface is increased by 50% after PAMAM layer was introduced into the NaOH-treated interface between epoxy and Al surface.