Experimental Fatigue Behaviour Investigation of Sisal Reinforced Epoxy Composite
No Thumbnail Available
Date
2019-07
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Due to their environment friendliness, natural abundance of the fibers, lower weight and cheap
production cost, natural fiber reinforced composites are being used in different application areas.
Properties of this material depend on many factors such as fiber reinforcement structure, loading
condition, and fiber orientation and so on. In this paper, the effect of fiber orientation on the fatigue
reaction of sisal reinforced epoxy composite is investigated. Sisal fiber is manually extracted and
prepared. The fiber-matrix weight composition can be taken in different ways. But, due to its better
mechanical property result and excellent performance, the weight ratio of sisal fiber to epoxy resin
is taken to be 30/70. With a hand-lay-up method, sisal reinforced epoxy composite is produced in
[0
0
0
]2 and [Random] fiber orientation and comparisons are made on their static and
fatigue reaction. Several specimens, from each group are subjected to static and cyclic loading using
Instron machine (Model 4483) with three-point bending test system. From the result, it is found that
the [0
0
,90
0
]2, [0
,45
0
0
]2 fiber orientation resulted in a better flexural property such as transversal load capacity,
flexural strength and modulus of elasticity. And [0
,45
]2 fiber orientation exhibits better fatigue life
with the [0
0
0
,90
0
]2 orientation scoring the lowest life at about 2/3 of the life of the former. The
randomly oriented specimens have the lowest flexural property but better fatigue reaction than that
of [0
0
,45
0
0
,45
]2 specimens.
Description
Keywords
Sisal Fiber, Fiber Orientation, Fatigue, Flexure, Sisal reinforced epoxy composite, Composite Materials, Three-Point Bending Test