INFLUENCE OF CATALYST AND CARBON SOURCE ON THE SYNTHESIS OF CARBON NANOTUBES IN A SEMI-CONTINUOUS INJECTION CHEMICAL VAPOR DEPOSITION METHOD

The injection chemical vapor deposition (CVD) method allows the semi-continuous production of pure multi-wall carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs). In order to find the most efficient catalyst material and carbon source, we investigated the quality and quantity of carbon nanotubes, when different metallocenes (ferrocene, cobaltocene and nickelocene) and hydrocarbons (benzene, toluene, xylene, cyclohexane, cyclohexanone, n-hexane, n-heptane, n-octane and n-pentane) are injected into the reaction furnace. The obtained samples were analyzed by Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM). The highest yield and the best quality were obtained when a mixture of ferrocenenickelocene was used as catalyst and xylene as carbon source. The weight of purified carbon nanotubes was higher than 50% of the weight of catalyst material for xylene and reached the 10% for all investigated carbon sources.