Study of Tensile Strength of Glass Epoxy Laminates with Varied Open Hole Diameter

Abstract

Composite materials such as fiber reinforced plastics are massively used in engineering due to their high strength to weight ratio when compared to the other conventional materials. Due to its high effectiveness, it has been applied in the aerospace and defence industry, automotive industry, civil, marine platforms and systems and sports equipment. The holes in the composites are the main cause for the structural failure due to the stress concentration observed in the components whilst loading. It is important to investigate the effect of holes on the properties of the structural components. The tensile strength of glass fiber reinforced plastic was investigated with respect to ASTM D3039 with the loading rate of 2 mm/min. The samples were made by vacuum assisted resin transfer infusion method (VARTM) and the diameter of centric holes considered are 4mm, 6mm, 8mm and 10mm. The results are analysed to understand the damage criteria that caused the structural failure. When compared with specimen without a hole and specimen with a hole of 10 mm diameter, the maximum load-carrying capacity of the specimen was reduced by 47.9%. All the specimens were subjected to the scanning electron microscope (SEM) to investigate the failure.