Title: Fracture behavior of short glass fibre and short carbon fibre reinforced polypropylene composites

Authors: Shao-Yun Fu, Yiu-Wing Mai, Bernd Lauke, Guanshui Xu, Chee-Yoon Yue

Addresses: CAMT, Department of Mechanical Engineering J07, The University of Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia. MEEM, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon, Hong Kong. Institute for Polymer Research, Dresden Hohe Str. 6, 01069 Dresden, Germany. Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of California, A361, Riverside, CA 92521, USA. School of Mechanical & Production Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore

Abstract: The fracture behaviour of polypropylene (PP) composites reinforced with short glass fibres (SGF) and short carbon fibres (SCF) was studied. The fracture toughness (Kc) of the composites was measured in the T- and L-direction using compact tension specimens made from the plaques manufactured. The study was focused on the combined effect of fibre volume fraction and microstructure (fibre length and alignment) on the fracture toughness of short fibre composites. Variation of the microstructure was increasing fibre content was discussed. The obtained results for the fracture toughness of both SGF/PP and SCF/PP systems was explained using the combined effect of fibre volume fraction and microstructure.

Keywords: fracture; polypropylene; short carbon fiber; short glass fiber.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMPT.2002.001303

International Journal of Materials and Product Technology, 2002 Vol.17 No.1/2, pp.108-120

Published online: 02 Jul 2003 *

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