Abstract
Growing environmental concerns and stringent waste-flow regulations make the development of sustainable composites a current industrial necessity. Natural fibre reinforcements are derived from renewable resources and are both cheap and biodegradable. When they are produced using eco-friendly, low hazard processes, then they can be considered as a sustainable source of fibrous reinforcement. Furthermore, their specific mechanical properties are comparable to commonly used, non-environmentally friendly glass-fibres. In this study, four types of abundant natural fibres (jute, kenaf, curaua, and flax) are investigated as naturally-derived constituents for high performance composites. Physical, thermal, and mechanical properties of the natural fibres are examined to evaluate their suitability as discontinuous reinforcements whilst also generating a database for material selection. Single fibre tensile and microbond tests were performed to obtain stiffness, strength, elongation, and interfacial shear strength of the fibres with an epoxy resin. Moreover, the critical fibre lengths of the natural fibres, which are important for defining the mechanical performances of discontinuous and short fibre composites, were calculated for the purpose of possible processing of highly aligned discontinuous fibres. This study is informative regarding the selection of the type and length of natural fibres for the subsequent production of discontinuous fibre composites.
Highlights
Owing to their light weight, superior specific strength, and stiffness, composite materials play a vital role in engineering applications and are continually replacing conventional monolithic materials.sustained growth in the composite industry can only be achieved if components and methodologies are sustainable, with the additional considerations of economic and environmental factors
The critical fibre length and aspect ratio of the fibres were calculated. These results are useful in informing the choices for fibre type and lengths that would be suitable for sustainable, high performance, discontinuous fibre composites
The calculated density value for flax is in agreement with the literature values (1.54 [28] and 1.40–1.55 g cm−3 [29]), which were obtained from different methods, such as helium pycnometer (1.54 g cm−3 [30]), gas pycnometer (1.49–1.52 g cm−3 [31]), and immersion in water (1.54 g cm−3 [32])
Summary
Owing to their light weight, superior specific strength, and stiffness, composite materials play a vital role in engineering applications and are continually replacing conventional monolithic materials. One of the drawbacks is the low thermal stability of natural fibres This limits the possibility to couple them with high temperature processing polymeric matrices [4]. Another limiting factor that needs to be accounted for during the design and manufacturing is their hydrophilic nature; this is especially critical for applications wherein these materials are exposed to humid conditions [7]. It is possible to obtain a sustainable and reliable solution for high performance composites that use natural fibres in a discontinuous fibre composite processing method. For obtaining high mechanical performances in discontinuous short fibre composites, one of the key parameters is the critical fibre length, which is highly dependent on the interfacial bonding between a matrix and a fibre. These results are useful in informing the choices for fibre type and lengths that would be suitable for sustainable, high performance, discontinuous fibre composites
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