Creep behaviour of ozone treated jute fabric/epoxy composites

Abstract

The present work attempted to study the creep behaviour of jute fabric/epoxy composites at different environment temperatures using several creep models (i.e., Burger’s model, Findley’s power law model, and Coupling model). The surface of jute fabrics was modified by ozone gas treatment to remove the non-cellulosic materials and thereby improve their adhesion with epoxy matrix. Further, the performance of ozone surface treatment was compared with traditional alkali treatment based on surface morphology, mechanical properties, hydrophilicity, etc. The ozone surface treatment was found to remove lignin and increase hydrophilicity of jute fibres to greater extent as compared to alkali treatment, however with higher tendency of defibrillation and fibre rupture. Later, the creep resistance of alkali treated jute fabric/epoxy composites was found superior to the ozone treated jute fabric/epoxy composites at lower temperature of 40°C and 70°C. However, the ozone treated jute fabric/epoxy composites showed higher instantaneous elastic deformation and lower viscous deformation at elevated temperatures of 70°C and 100°C. The ozone treated jute fabric/epoxy composites showed extended temperature range of 100°C–120°C to restrict segmental mobility of epoxy matrix and depicted higher interfacial shear strength properties from the microbead pull out test.