e-ISSN 2231-8534
ISSN 0128-7702
F. Bajuri, N. Mazlan and M. R. Ishak
Pertanika Journal of Social Science and Humanities, Volume 25, Issue 3, July 2017
Keywords: Compressive, flexural, kenaf, nanoparticles, nanosilica
Published on: 20 Jun 2017
Kenaf natural fibre is used as a sustainable form of material to reinforce polymeric composite. However, natural fibres usually do not perform as well as synthetic fibres. Silica nanoparticle is a material with high surface area and its high interfacial interaction with the matrix results in its improvement. In this research, silica nanoparticles were introduced into epoxy resin as a filler material to improve the mechanical properties of the kenaf-reinforced epoxy. They were dispersed into the epoxy using a homogeniser at 3000 rpm for 10 minutes. The composites were fabricated by spreading the silica filled epoxy evenly onto the kenaf mat before hot pressing the resin wet kenaf mat. The results show for flexural properties, composites with higher fibre and silica volume content generally had better properties with specimen 601 (60 vol% kenaf and1 vol% silica) having the highest strength at 68.9 MPa. Compressive properties were erratic with specimen 201 (20 vol% kenaf and 1 vol% silica) having the highest strength at 53.6 MPa.
ISSN 0128-7702
e-ISSN 2231-8534
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