Abstract
The effects of carbon fibre hybridisation on the thermal properties of woven kenaf-reinforced epoxy composites were studied. Woven kenaf hybrid composites of different weave designs of plain and satin and fabric counts of5×5and6×6were manually prepared by a vacuum infusion technique. A composite made from 100% carbon fibre was served for a comparison purpose. Thermal properties of pure carbon fibre and hybrid composites were determined by using a thermogravimetric analyser (TGA) and differential scanning calorimeter (DSC). It was found that a hybrid composite with higher kenaf fibre content (fabric count6×6) showed better thermal stability while the highest thermal stability was found in the pure carbon fibre composite. The TG and DTG results showed that the amount of residue decreased in the plain-designed hybrid composite compared to the satin-designed hybrid composite. The DSC data revealed that the presence of woven kenaf increased the decomposition temperature.
Highlights
Over the last decade, natural fibre is known as a reinforcement material in a polymer composite
TG and DTG curves revealed that the thermal stability of the pure carbon fibre composite was higher than that of the hybrid composite, the thermal stability of the hybrid composites improved as higher content of kenaf fibre was used, i.e., fabric density of 6 × 6
It was found that using the plain weave design of woven kenaf has improved the overall thermal stability of the samples compared to that of the satin design
Summary
Natural fibre is known as a reinforcement material in a polymer composite. A natural fibre-reinforced polymer composite (NFRPC) is a composite material made up of a polymer matrix mixed with natural fibres, such as oil palm [1], jute [2, 3], flax [4], banana fibre [5], kenaf [6, 7], and ramie [8] These fibres are widely used as reinforcements in the NFRPC due to the fact that they are low in density, good in mechanical properties, and recyclable and have excellent strength per weight materials [9, 10]. For the past several years, kenaf fibres have been proven suitable for fibre-reinforced composite applications such as particleboard, medium density fibreboard (MDF), polymer matrix composite (PMC), pultruded products, nonwoven materials, and woven materials
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