Effect of Yttrium Oxide Particles on the Mechanical Properties of Polymer Matrix Composite

Polymeric composite materials have emerged as one of the best composites used in modern and advanced applications due to the important and useful properties such as lightweight, excellent thermal and electrical insulation as well as relatively good resistance. In this paper, a composite material has been manufactured with polymer matrix which is reinforced with ceramic particles and the mechanical properties have been studied. Epoxy resin Quick mast 105 has been mixed with a hardener by a ratio 3: 1, then reinforced with different volume fractions of Yttrium oxides Y2O3 (0, 1.5, 3, 4.5, 6%). The composites samples are manufactured with hand lay-up molding, then the mechanical properties such as hardness, compressive strength, flexural strength and the wear rates with different loads (5, 10, 15, 20) Newton are investigated. The results showed that both hardness and compressive strength were increased by increasing the content of the reinforcement as it increased by 62% and 12% respectively, in contrast to flexural strength which decreased by increasing the Y2O3 content by 45%, the wear results showed a decrease in the wear rate by increasing the Y2O3 content up to 3% and then the wear rate is proportional with the reinforcement content and 0% recorded the highest wear rate, on the other hand by increasing the load of the wear rate test, it was found that the wear rate increased at all the ratios of reinforcement.