Modelling and analysis of erosion wear behaviour of hybrid composites using Taguchi experimental design

Abstract

This article describes the development of multi-phase hybrid composites consisting of polyester reinforced with E-glass fibre and ceramic particulates. It further investigates the erosion wear response of these composites and presents a comparison on the influence of two different particulate fillers cement by-pass dust (CBPD) and alumina (Al2O3) on the wear characteristics of glass-polyester composites. For this purpose, the erosion test schedule in an air jet-type test rig is made following design of experiment approach using Taguchi's orthogonal arrays. Taguchi approach enables one to determine optimal parameter settings that lead to minimization of erosion rate. The results indicate that erodent size, filler content, impingement angle, and impact velocity influence the wear rate significantly. This study reveals that addition of hard particulate fillers like CBPD and Al2O3 improves the erosion resistance of glass-polyester composites significantly. An industrial waste like CBPD exhibits reasonably good filler characteristics. Finally, a popular evolutionary approach known as genetic algorithm is used to generalize the method of finding out optimal factor settings for minimum wear rate.