Natural fiber polymer composites have been largely used in applications like aerospace, automotive, marine, and other civil structures, where mechanical and tribological properties are of prime consideration. The performance of hybrid composites can be improved by using different natural fibers and adding particulate fillers to them. In this study, mechanical and tribological properties of jute/sisal/E-glass fabrics reinforcing matrix such as natural rubber and epoxy filled with different proportion of tungsten carbide (WC) powder were studied. Mechanical properties like tensile strength, flexural strength, impact strength, and also tribological behavior like two-body abrasive wear of composite were studied. Taguchi technique was employed for wear analysis. Results revealed that there is a significant change in the mechanical properties and enhancement of wear behavior was noticed due to the incorporation of filler (WC) particles.
Dielectric study was investigated in order to probe the interfacial region fibers/matrix of the polyester composite reinforced with alfa/wool/thermo-binder fibers. Dielectric spectra were measured in the frequency range from 10−1 Hz to 106 Hz, and temperature interval from 40 °C to 150 °C. This study revealed the presence of two dielectric relaxations in the composite. While the first one was attributed to the α mode relaxation associated with the glass transition of the matrix, the second was associated with the conductivity resulting from the carriers' charges diffusion noted for high temperature above glass transition and low frequencies. As this study did not show the presence of the interfacial polarization effect in the composite, it was accomplished with the vibrational study using the FT-IR and Raman techniques. A great compatibility between fibers and matrix was proven by a less hydrophilic character of the reinforcement giving rise to additional valence vibrations from wool fibers and hydrogen bonds.
The presence of wool fibres in non-woven Alfa fibres sheet was investigated as a mean of improving adhesion of Alfa fibre-reinforced unsaturated polyester composite. FT-IR and Raman spectroscopy results revealed that such improvement could occur by a decrease in the hydrophilic character of the Alfa fibres owing to the presence of wool fibres. Hence, physical and chemical interactions could happen between the reinforcement and the matrix as demonstrated by FT-IR and Raman spectroscopy results. Tensile testing performed on this composite confirmed that such adhesion could occur according to its excellent specific parameters despite of its low tensile strength attributed to a higher fibre to fibre contact of wool fibres.
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