Influence of fiber content on the mechanical and dynamic mechanical properties of glass/ramie polymer composites

The combination of glass and ramie fibers with a polyester matrix can produce a hybrid material that is competitive to all glass composites (e.g. those used in the automobile industry). In this work, glass and ramie fibers cut to 45 mm in length were used to produce hybrid polymer composites by resin transfer molding (RTM), aiming to evaluate their physical, mechanical and dynamic mechanical properties as a function of the relative glass-ramie volume fractions and the overall fiber content (10, 21 and 31 vol.%). Higher fiber content and higher ramie fiber fraction in the hybrid composites yielded lower weight composites, but higher water absorption in the composite. The mechanical properties (impact and interlaminar shear strength) of the composites were improved by using higher fiber content, and the composite with 31 vol.% of reinforcement yielded the lowest value for the reinforcement effectiveness coefficient C, as expected. Although the mechanical properties were improved for higher fiber content, the glass transition temperature did not vary significantly. Additionally, as found by analyzing the adhesion factor A, improved adhesion tended to occur for the composites with lower fiber content (10%) and higher ramie fiber fraction (0:100) and the results for the adhesion factor A did not correspond to those found by the analysis of the tan delta peak height. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.