Improvement on cost-performance ratio of fiberglass/carbon fiber hybrid composite

Abstract

Fiberglass composite (FG) is widely used as a metal substitute in general applications due to its corrosion and chemical resistance, relatively high strength, and low cost. Still, the FG is deficient in performance and relatively heavy for airframes. Carbon fiber composite (CF) is utilized instead as it has greater performance and lower weight. However, the CF is brittle and expensive. Thus, in this work, we combine FG and CF into two types of hybrid composites to achieve a cost-effective solution with greater or comparable mechanical properties to those of CF. The first one uses FG as core and CF as skins (SWFG). The second one uses CF as core and FG as skins (SWCF). Their mechanical properties and cost-performance ratios (CPR) are compared. The results show that the mechanical properties of the SWFG composite, especially the modulus of elasticity, are considerably improved over the FG and nearly match those of the CF. Also, the SWFG has better CPR regarding tensile properties and flexural modulus than the SWCF and the CF. The SWFG shows promising potential as an alternative to the CF due to its comparable performance and almost 40% lower cost than the CF.