Abrasive water jet drilling of advanced sustainable bio-fibre-reinforced polymer/hybrid composites: a comprehensive analysis of machining-induced damage responses

Abstract

This paper aims at investigating the effects of variable traverse speeds on machining-induced damage of fibre-reinforced composites, using the abrasive water jet (AWJ) drilling. Three different types of epoxy-based composites laminates fabricated by vacuum bagging technique containing unidirectional (UD) flax, hybrid carbon-flax and carbon fibre-reinforced composite were used. The drilling parameters used were traverse speeds of 20, 40, 60 and 80 mm/min, constant water jet pressure of 300 MPa and a hole diameter of 10 mm. The results obtained depict that the traverse speed had a significant effect with respect to both surface roughness and delamination drilling-induced damage responses. Evidently, an increase in water jet traverse speed caused an increase in both damage responses of the three samples. Significantly, the CFRP composite sample recorded the lowest surface roughness damage response, followed by C-FFRP, while FFRP exhibited the highest. However, samples of FFRP and hybrid C-FFRP recorded lowest and highest delamination damage responses, respectively. The discrepancy in both damage responses, as further validated with micrographs of colour video microscopy (CVM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray micro-computed tomography (X-ray μCT), is attributed to the different mechanical properties of the reinforced fibres, fibre orientation/ply stacking and hybridisation of the samples.

Abrasive water jet machining of Sisal/Pineapple epoxy hybrid composites with the addition of various fly ash filler

“…Kerf angle and material removal rate is mainly depending on traverse speed [27]. Delamination and surface roughness property showed maximum rate at higher traverse speed of 80 mm min −1 [28]. Sodium hydroxide treatment at 4% enhanced the machining property of coconut shealth natural composites.…”

“…Filler addition will provide improvement to brittle nature of epoxy resin matrix. Filler surface created a tight bonding with the matrix, which reduces the erosion of fiber particles at higher WP [28].…”

Abrasive waterjet machining of fiber-reinforced composites: a state-of-the-art review

“…Coconut sheath-reinforced composite provided more damages such as fibers shear out, fiber damage, and matrix degradation compared to glass mat-reinforced composite due to better interfacial sticking capability. Dhakal et al [51] performed AWJ drilling on three composites, namely unidirectional flax, carbon fiber, and hybrid flax-carbon composite. Synthetic CFRP and natural flax composite have minimum and maximum SR, which may be due to mechanical properties of fibers.…”

“…Hole diameter and jet pressure were suggested as significant parameters on SR, while SOD and jet pressure were found as dominating parameter on delamination. Dhakal et al [51] performed AWJ drilling on three composites, namely, unidirectional flax, carbon fiber, and hybrid flax-carbon composite, to study the effect of variable traverse speed. SR and delamination damage increased in all three FRP composite with increase in traverse speed.…”

Cutting Processes of Natural Fiber-Reinforced Polymer Composites

“…Which operating parameters are optimal when using a specific cutting process? Cutting processes can be classified into conventional processes that use solid tools such as drilling, sawing and milling, and non-traditional processes which include laser beam machining (LBM), ultrasonic drilling [ 11 ], and abrasive water jet machining (AWJM) [ 19 ]. The most common methods of cutting NFRPs are covered in this study to answer the questions above on determining which cutting methods are more suitable for cutting NFRP composites and which operating parameters are optimal for each process.…”