Experimental Study of Tensile, Flexural and Impact Strength of Basalt/Glass FRP Hybrid Composite with Carbon Black

Abstract

Metal components have been replaced by composite ones in the modern engineering aspects due to various reasons such as strength to weight ratio, ease of manufacturing as well as aesthetic value. Currently majority of composites are made by using synthetic fibres which again is a concern for the environment because of non-biodegradability issues with synthetic fibres. Hence natural fibres appear to be an alternative option to synthetic fibres. But the major drawback would be the strength of the fibres and its behaviour with its surrounding environment hence hybrid appears to be the possible solution in order to balance both the constraints of strength and environment. This study describes the mechanical properties of a hybrid composite comprising of Basalt fibre and Glass fibre developed by using hand lay-up techniques. Woven Basalt fibres and Glass fibres were used for fabricating the hybrid composites, carbon black as nano fillers, vinyl ester resin as matrix with different fibre stacking sequences. The result shows that the reinforcement of woven Basalt and Glass fibres hybrid composites with carbon black has a significant influence on the mechanical properties of the composites. The stacking sequence also has an effect on the strength of the specimen. The tensile strength of hybrid composite having stacking sequence B/3G/B/3G/B increase by 15.49 % with the addition of 9% carbon black whereas the stacking sequence G/3B/G/3B/G has a decrease in tensile strength by 21.77%. The flexural strength of the hybrid B/3G/B/3G/B decrease by 72.5% with the addition of carbon black while the hybrid G/3B/G/3B/G shows an increase by 32.38%. The highest impact strength is of basalt with 6% composite.