Investigating mechanical strength of a natural fibre polymer composite using SiO2 nano-filler

Abstract

Introducing nano-fillers in natural fibre polymer composite materials have attained a greater attention in recent days due to their distinct behavior in improving the mechanical characteristics of the composites with less effort. In this study, the effect of introducing nano-SiO2 filler in kenaf fibre polymer composite on their mechanical characteristics is analyzed. The nano-fillers with five different mass fractions namely 0%, 1%, 2%, 3%, and 4% were tested in this work. The tensile, compressive and impact strengths of the composites were investigated. The results evidenced that the increment in nano-filler content proportionally improved the strength of the composite until the addition of 2% of nanofiller and then, the improvement was not impressive. The maximum enhancement of 20.61% in tensile strength, 23.71% in compressive strength, and 22.88% in impact strength was attained with 2% fraction of nanofiller in composite.