Modification of sodium montmorilonite has been performed via
an ion-exchange reaction with alkyl-ammoniums resulting in two
different groups of clay products that were used for the preparation
of the 2nd and 3rd series of nanocomposites. The 2nd group of
modified montmorillonites were prepared using alkylammonium
surfactants with varying carbon chain length (4, 8, 12, 16 and 18
carbon atoms), while the alkylammonium concentration was kept
equivalent to 1.5 times the cation exchange capacity (CEC) of the
clay. The 3rd group was prepared by using only hexadecylammonium
for the modification, but varying the modification level by
adding hexadecylammonium salt from 50% to 200% of the clay CEC.
Further details on clay modification were reported on a previous
study of ours [13]