Mechanical Characterizations of Natural Fiber Reinforced Composite Materials

The present work consists of mechanical characterization of Natural Fiber Reinforced Composites (NFRC) consisting of epoxy resin reinforced with jute fiber and bamboo fiber. Hand lay-up technique was used for fabrication of the composite specimens. The specimens were prepared according to the ASTM D3039 and D3410 standards for tensile and compressive test respectively. Experimentation was carried out using INSTRON 8801. The results were compared with the glass/epoxy composite. The effect of fiber orientation (0 /90 , 15 /-75 , 30 /-60 , and 45 /-45 ) was analyzed and it shows that the fiber orientation of 0 /90 provides higher strength and stiffness than other fiber orientations used in this work. For compressive test jute composite shows higher strength as compared to bamboo composite but it is not at par with glass composites.