The present research focuses on the study of a new family of bio-based aliphatic epoxy nanocomposites for coatings and other high performance applications. A sorbitol glycidyl ether (SGE) epoxy resin has been cured with three polyamines , a poly(ethylene oxide) diamine (PEO) , a poly(propylene oxide) diamine (PPO), as well as triethylenetetraamine (TETA). The degree of dispersion of an organically modified montmorillonite (OMMT) clay was assessed via x-ray diffraction (XRD) in both the neat resin components and cured films. In general, the compatibility of both diamines with the organoclay was found to be good. While this would seem to imply enhanced dispersion, in practice low molecular polyetherdiamines will intercalate but not exfoliate montmorillonite layers due to their inability to screen interactions between adjacent layers. Both the neat resin components and the cured materials display multiple diffraction peaks.Nevertheless, the nanocomposite films showed excellent transparency, consistent with the degree of dispersion implied by the XRD patterns derived from these materials. The curing behavior of all samples was followed by near-IR (NIR) spectroscopy. The extent of epoxy conversion was high for neat and filled systems. The effect of the OMMT in the systems is related to interactions between the curing agents and the clay modifier as well as the silicate layers themselves. SGE/PEO and SGE/TETA systems gave earlier gelation times compared to SGE/PPO systems as observed by viscosity measurements. In addition to cure kinetics, mechanical properties were also studied. The SGE/TETA/OMMT system displayed a larger increase in Young’s modulus (as measured via tensile testing) compared to all other nanocomposites, consistent with the idea that this system should display more hydrogen bonding and stronger interactions than the other systems studied. Similar results were observed via Shore D hardness measurements. These results demonstrate the possibility to prepare, process and cured bio-based epoxy clay nanocomposites with enhanced performance. Ongoing work is focused on a broader range of bio-based formulations with enhanced hydrophobicity.