Abstract

Mechanically ground recycled carbon fibers (rCFs) reinforced polymer composites were investigated in this paper. The rCFs were collected from the woven prepreg waste. The as-received (rCFs-AR) and cyclic cryogenic treated (rCFs-T) carbon fibers were incorporated separately in the epoxy matrix composite. The objective of this study is to study the wear behaviour of the epoxy composites with respect to the as-received and treated rCFs. Prior to the composite fabrication, the surface morphologies of rCFs-AR and rCFs-T were examined with the scanning electron microscope (SEM). It is found that the cryogenic treatment is effective in removing the epoxy resin from the carbon fiber due to the mismatches in the thermal expansion at the interface of rCFs and epoxy. The rCFs-AR and rCFs-T were homogeneously distributed in epoxy resin through ultrasonication. The void-free samples were then fabricated using vacuum casting technique. Micro Pin-on-disc Tribotester (CM-9109) was used to test the tribological behaviour of the polymer composites. The coefficient of friction (CoF) and wear rate of epoxy composites revealed that the reinforcement effect of rCFs-T is better than that of the rCFs-AR as the incorporation of rCFs-T decreases the CoF and improves the wear resistance of epoxy composites in comparison with rCFs-AR. The tribological results clearly showed that the rCFs was a valuable product worth to be reused as reinforcement in the new composite, as the incorporation of treated rCFs was effective in improving the tribological properties of the epoxy composites.

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