Effect of Orientation of Glass Fiber on Mechanical Properties of GRP Composites

Abstract

Glass Fiber Reinforced polymer matrix composites are one of the most important engineering materials required for a variety of advanced and sophisticated applications in modern industry. The two components of a GRP composites are the matrix (the continuous phase) and the reinforcing glass. The matrix itself does not provide the strength, but it serves to bond the reinforcing glass fibers and to transfer the load to the reinforcing phase. Glass reinforcements provide strength for the GRP composites that is why we can say that mechanical properties of GRP composites depends mainly on the orientation, amount and type of fiber reinforcement present in it. The main applications of GRP composites are in chemical industry as storage tanks, in aerospace industry, and mainly in construction industry as cladding over other construction materials and other non-load-bearing applications.In the present work different types of glass fabric like chopped strands and roving, were selected to study the effect of their different orientations on mechanical properties of GRP composites. Thickness of sheets and resin content were kept constant for all the samples. Hand lay up method was used for the production of GRP composite.The mechanical properties like tensile strength, impact strength and hardness along with density of the samples were investigated using tensile testing machine, densitometer, charpy impact testing machine and rockwell hardness tester respectively.