Studies on Bamboo/Glass Fiber Reinforced USP and VE Resin

Abstract

The effects of weight fraction and length of short bamboo and glass fibers on flexural strength and inter-laminar shear strength (ILSS) of vinyl ester resin and unsaturated polyester (USP) resins were investigated. The bamboo fibers were isolated from the bamboo plant by treating them with dilute solution of sodium hydroxide (0.1 and 1 N NaOH) for 72 h and then boiling them in a pressure cooker for 30 min. The fibers were separated, dried, and cut into 5 or 10 mm lengths. Composites were fabricated using vinyl ester resin or USP resin as binders. The flexural properties of glass/bamboo fiber reinforced vinyl ester resins were higher than those based on USP resins. This may be due to better wetting of the fibers by VE resins due to their low viscosity and possibility of hydrogen bond formation with hydroxyl group on bamboo fibers. Hybrid composites were fabricated using 50 wt% of fibers. The wt% of bamboo fibers in these hybrid composites was varied as 25, 50, and 75 wt% of chopped glass fibers (5 mm). Replacement of 25 wt% of glass fibers did not affect the flexural modulus and a marginal increase in ILSS was observed. However, replacement of 75% glass fibers by bamboo fibers resulted in a significant decrease in flexural strength, modulus and ILSS.

Bamboo fibre reinforced biocomposites: A review

“…Researchers stated that bamboo fibres can replace up to 25 wt.% of glass fibres without lowering mechanical properties of glass fibre based composites [81]. They observed that quantity of bamboo fibres loading gradually increases the modulus and strength of fabricated biocomposites.…”

Dynamic mechanical analysis and morphological studies of glass/bamboo fiber reinforced unsaturated polyester resin‐based hybrid composites

“…Natural fibers like coir, jute, oil palm, sisal fibers have all been proved to be good reinforcement in thermoset and thermoplastic matrices 2–5. In our previous study, we have found that the replacement of glass fiber, upto a certain extent, by bamboo fibers to be an effective reinforcement in polyester matrix 6…”

Changes in the morphological–mechanical properties and thermal stability of bamboo fibers during the processing of alkaline treatment

“…Thus, composites with bamboo fiber reinforcements are emerging as realistic materials in the structural community because of their advantages such as low cost, acceptable specific properties, weather resistant, dimensional stability, and biodegradability over conventional composites . Mandal et al performed a comparative study on the mechanical properties of glass/bamboo fiber reinforced composites . The results show that there is no significant difference in the mechanical properties of composites under the condition that 25 wt% of glass fibers are substituted by bamboo fibers.…”