Studying the effect of jute fiber reinforcement on epoxy mechanical properties

Abstract

This study investigate the Epoxy performance after reinforcing with Jute fibers. Before reinforcement process, the natural jute fibers were immersed in three different concentrations of acetic acid (1%, 5%,10%) for one hour, then epoxy composites were made from these treated fibers in a way that the weight fraction of jute fibers is 30% also other samples of composite were made from epoxy but with untreated jute fibers. Upon making the reinforced composites, different mechanical properties were tested, namely shore-D hardness, roughness, shock resistance and a Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) examination for the samples that had been subjected to the impact test in order to examine the fracture surface of those samples.This study proved that when epoxy reinforced with 30% of natural untreated jute fibers to a bout 30% increase in the impact strength of the composite.