Development and Characterization of Hybrid Flax -Banana Fiber Reinforced Epoxy Composite for Ceiling Fan Blade Application
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Date
2023
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
A fan blade is the major component of fans, it used for ventilation systems, cooling systems, refrigeration, boilers, and dust collection purposes. The materials used to fabricate ceiling fan blades are fabricated steel, cast or forged aluminum, plastic, fiberglass, or other exotic materials. The present work aims to develop and characterize the mechanical and water absorption properties of hybrid flax-banana fiber reinforced epoxy composite. In addition it examined the suitability of the composite material for ceiling fan blade application. The composite manufacturing process includes fibers extraction, fibers surface treatment, fibers property test, composite plate’s fabrication, composite specimen's mechanical and water absorption tests. Based on the experimental test result, the static structural analysis is performed to analyze the induced stress and deformation on the ceiling fan propellers. The fibers are extracted through water retting and manual extraction methods. The flax and banana fibers are treated with 5% and 3% of NaOH solution to increase the interfacial bonding between the fiber and matrix materials. The fibers are hybridized manually with 1:1, 3:1, and 1:3 fibers ratio. The composite plates are fabricated with eleven sub- composition of 60/40%, 70/30%, and 80/20% resin to fiber volume fraction. The tensile, flexural, impact, and water absorption property tests are conducted using ASTM D3039, ASTM D790, ASTM D6110, and ASTM D570-99 standards. The ceiling fan blade geometry and static structural analysis performed using Catia.V5 and Ansy’s 19.2 software.
Overall, the experimental test results shows that 70/15/15% volume fraction exhibits the highest tensile strength of 68.9MPa and flexural strength of 169.14 MPa respectively. The highest impact strength result was observed on 60/20/20%volume fraction. The highest water penetration resistance was observed on 80/15/5%. Overall, the experimental test results shows 70/15/15% volume fraction has the highest tensile strength of 68.9MPa and flexural strength of 169.14 MPa. On the other hand, the highest impact strength result 10.83J is observed on 60/20/20%. In a water absorption test result, the least water absorption property is obtained on 80/15/5%. In addition, 70/15/15% has presented the second lowest water absorption property. Based on the structural analysis, HFBFREC exhibited the lower Von-misses stress of 2.4MPa and 0.9mm deformation.
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Keywords
Flax fiber, Banana fiber, Epoxy, composite, ceiling fan blade.