A study on the morphology of thin copper films on para-aramid yarns and their influence on the yarn’s electro-conductive and mechanical properties

The latest technological advances in new materials and devices enabled wearable systems to be created by utilizing textile solutions. These solutions require electro-conductive yarns as a basic component. Although the production of electro-conductive yarn is widely reported, research is still necessary to characterize them to advance their electro-conductive and mechanical properties. Hence, we served this need and characterized copper-coated para-aramid yarns produced by an in-house developed electroless deposition method. In this paper we present our investigation on the yarn’s copper layer characteristics after deposition. Furthermore, we looked, in depth, at the yarn’s electro-conductive properties before and after washing as well as their mechanical properties before and after copper deposition. We found a dependency of the copper layer morphology on its deposition time. This is directly correlated to the resulting layer thickness and hence to the yarn’s electro-conductive properties, demonstrating the autocatalytic nature of the coating process. Above that, the electro-conductive properties of the coated yarn linearly decrease with washing cycles. Furthermore, the copper coating impairs the yarn’s mechanical properties decreasing its specific stress at break by 30%.