Effect of boron carbide particles inclusion on the mechanical behaviour of S2-Glass fiber based polyester composites

The requirement for very high-performance composites is increasing day by day due to their demand for use in various structural applications. Even though the conventional composites are able to provide high performance for several of the applications, the demand to push the capabilities of the available composites is becoming a great research interest for many of the researchers and engineers. With the increased capabilities of materials, the man explores the unknown frontiers in different fields. One easy to achieve high performance from the existing material is to change their configuration and make hybrid composites with improved properties out of them. The mixing of ceramic particles with the matrix material and then preparing the fiber reinforced composite material using that matrix material is one method hybridization in composite materials. The main focus of the current research work is to predict the elastic properties of the hybrid composites where continuous S2-glass fibers are reinforced in a polyester matrix emended with micro boron carbide particles. The influence of inclusion of boron carbide (B4C) particles on the elastic properties of the S2- Glass fiber based polyester composite at different fiber volume fractions was inspected using the technique of finite element analysis (FEA). The predicted elastic properties using FEA were compared with the analytical results. The outcomes suggest that B4C micro particles are one of the better reinforcement options for enhancing the elastic properties of the fiber reinforced polyester composites. (C) 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.