Crashworthiness characterization of jute fiber woven mat reinforced epoxy composite tube for structural application using Taguchi’s method

Abstract

This work investigates the crashworthiness of jute fiber mat reinforced epoxy composite circular tubes by introducing holes around the tube circumference. The composite tubes were tested under quasi-static compressive mode. Based on Taguchi’s method considering L27 orthogonal array, the optimization of design variables was carried out by selecting three design variables with three levels such as lengths (70, 140 and 210 mm), hole diameter (6, 8 and 10 mm) and number of drill holes (2, 4 and 6) with changing their position. From experiments, the crashworthiness indicators like maximum stress, absorbed energy and specific absorbed energy were calculated. By introducing the holes on tubes, the crashworthiness was varied, and in optimization, the Analysis of Variance showed the interaction effect of design variables. The signal-to-noise results showed the maximum effect of variables on crashworthiness. The developed regression model results were compared with experimental results. The mechanism of failure of all samples was examined from photography.