Search results for "composites"
showing 10 items of 1905 documents
Delamination study of through-thickness reinforced composite laminates via two-phase interface model
2007
A technique to enhance the strength of the composite laminates in the thickness direction consists in inserting through-thickness reinforcement, by which the potential delamination crack faces are bridged in order to increase the interlaminar fracture strength. In this paper, the composite delamination is analyzed in the context of non-linear fracture mechanics making use of the interface concept. The presence of the reinforcement fibres provides an anisotropic elastic and post-elastic mechanical response, which herein is described by an original two-phase interface model. The two phases, namely the adhesive joint (or matrix of the composite) and the reinforcement, are characterized by thei…
Contribution to the development of 100% bio-based composites : synthesis of bio-based polyepoxides, supercritical CO2 treatment of hemp fibers and im…
2018
This thesis contributes to the development of 100% bio-based hemp/epoxy composites. Current environmental issues favor the emergence of materials derived from renewable resources such as plant fibres and a wide range of bio-based building-blocks, source of epoxy prepolymers in particular. An intensive investigation of the two constituents (hemp fibres and polyepoxidic matrix) is carried out before the composites manufacturing. Supercritical CO2 treatment is applied to hemp fibres used as reinforcement in composite materials. This treatment, not optimized, leads to better individualization as well as a decrease in the hygroscopic power of the fibres. These aspects, which are essential in ord…
Mechanical testing and numerical modelling of pull-wound carbon-epoxy spinnaker poles
2002
The paper deals with experimental testing and numerical simulation of the mechanical behaviour of multi-layer cylindrical coupons, of two different diameters, made in carbon-epoxy composite. The aim of the study is to provide a simple and effective numerical model that can be used as a design tool for structural elements having analogous geometrical and manufacturing characteristics. The numerical analysis, performed in the elastic regime with a standard finite element (FE) code, was strongly correlated with the laboratory determination of fibre-volume fractions and of some elastic parameters of the material system. Other parameters, like the shear modulus values G, were in fact appropriate…
PLA based biocomposites reinforced with Posidonia oceanica leaves
2018
Abstract Biocomposites can valorize some natural products related to natural processes or crop and waste industries. In this work, leaves of Posidonia oceanica (PO), dominant sea grass in the Mediterranean Sea, were used to prepare PLA based biocomposites. Materials were prepared by melt mixing PLA with PO as filler. The morphology as well as the mechanical and thermal properties of PLA/PO composites were evaluated and related with the influence of the content and size of PO. Moreover, the experimental elastic moduli of the biocomposites was modelled employing the Halpin–Tsai (HT) model. Furthermore, in order to take into consideration the high porosity of PO leaves, the HT parameters relat…
Effect of aggregation of a dispersed rigid filler on the elastic characteristics of a polymer composite
1986
We proposed a method for describing the effective elastic characteristics of a polymer composite with a rigid aggregating filler. An important feature of such a medium is the variable coupling of the inclusion phase in relation to its volume content. A change in the degree of coupling of the filler is accounted for by introducing an additional parameter. We examined a method of determining the coupling parameter from the results of statistical modeling of the geometry of the medium. Using the example of a calcite-HDPE composite, we showed that aggregation has a significant effect on the dependence of the elastic modulus on the volume content of filler; satisfactory agreement was obtained be…
Study and evaluation of dispersion of polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane and silica filler in polypropylene composites
2018
Various methods were used for evaluation of homogeneity of polypropylene (PP) matrix composites with octakis([n‐octyl]dimethylsiloxy)octasilsesquioxane, octakis([n‐octadecyl]dimethylsiloxy)octasilsesquioxane, and silica (SiO2) fillers. The filler dispersion was determined on the basis of the results from the wide‐angle X‐ray scattering (WAXS) analysis, from the tests of selected mechanical properties, from scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with energy dispersive X‐ray spectroscopy and from the decomposable entropic descriptor method. The use of different methods allowed to evaluate homogeneity of PP composites on various levels and with different precisions. The dispersion degree was found…
The effect of mechanical defects on the strength distribution of elementary flax fibres
2009
Flax fibres are finding non-traditional applications as reinforcement of composite materials. The mechanical properties of fibres are affected by the natural variability in plant as well as the damage accumulated during processing, and thus have considerable variability that necessitates statistical treatment of fibre characteristics. The strength distribution of elementary flax fibres has been determined at several fibre lengths by standard tensile tests, and the amount of kink bands in the fibres evaluated by optical microscopy. Strength distribution function, based on the assumption that the presence of kink bands limits fibre strength, is derived and found to provide reasonable agreemen…
Modeling strength scatter of elementary flax fibers: The effect of mechanical damage and geometrical characteristics
2011
Elementary bast fibers, apart from acceptable specific mechanical properties, possess a marked variability in geometrical and damage characteristics, which affects their axial tensile strength. A strength distribution function is derived that allows for the effect of kink bands and the scatter of fiber diameter. The distribution function is validated by applying it to the experimental strength data of both intact, carefully hand-decorticated, and damaged elementary flax fibers obtained by standard processing. The results suggest that the presence of kink bands is a limiting factor for the fiber strength.
In situ monitoring of moisture uptake of flax fiber reinforced composites under humid/dry conditions
2021
The use of green materials such as natural fiber-reinforced composites represents an increasingly stringent prerogative in the future planning of industrial and non-industrial production. The optimization of these materials is the main aim of the current research, focused on the evaluation of the behavior of flax fiber reinforced composites exposed to isothermal adsorption and desorption cycles, at varying the partial pressure of water vapor (P/P0). For this purpose, the moisture uptake and the morphology changes of the composite material and their constituents were in situ monitored through a measurement protocol, by using a dynamic vapor sorption (DVS) analysis, coupled with an environmen…
Effectiveness of sodium acetate treatment on the mechanical properties and morphology of natural fiber-reinforced composites
2021
This paper aims to investigate the ability of an eco-friendly and cheap treatment based on sodium acetate solutions to improve the mechanical properties of flax fiber-reinforced composites. Flax fibers were treated for 5 days (i.e., 120 h) at 25 °C with mildly alkaline solutions at 5%, 10% and 20% weight content of the sodium salt. Quasi-static tensile and flexural tests, Charpy impact tests and dynamical mechanical thermal (DMTA) tests were carried out to evaluate the mechanical properties of the resulting composites. Fourier transform infrared analysis (FTIR) was used to evaluate the chemical modification on the fibers surface due to the proposed treatment, whereas scanning electron micro…