Abstract
A scalable technique was introduced to produce high volume lightweight composites using sheet molding compound (SMC) manufacturing method by replacing 10wt% glass fibers (GF) with a small amount of cellulose nanocrystals (CNC). The incorporation of 1 and 1.5wt% CNC by dispersing in the epoxy matrix of short GF/epoxy SMC composites with 25wt% GF content (25GF/CNC-epoxy) produced 7.5% lighter composites with the same tensile and flexural properties of 35GF/epoxy composites with no CNC. The addition of 1wt% CNC in 25GF/CNC-epoxy SMC composites resulted in increases of 15% in elastic modulus, 11% in flexural modulus and 14% in flexural strength, reaching the corresponding properties of 35GF/epoxy SMC composites. Moreover, it was found that although addition of CNC did not alter the impact energy, removing 10wt% GF resulted in reduction of impact energy.
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