Fracture behaviour of rubber- and silica nanoparticle-toughened glass fibre composites under static and fatigue loading
File(s)
Accepted version
Author(s)
Awang Ngah, Shamsiah
Taylor, AC
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
The crosslinked polymers used in fibre composites are very brittle, and require toughening for structural applications. Research over many years has increased the fracture energy, but the fatigue resistance of these toughened polymers is very poor, limiting the optimisation of structures. This work reports the first successful use of hybrid toughening to increase both the quasi-static interlaminar fracture energy, GIC, and the fatigue threshold strain-energy release-rate, Gth. Amine-cured epoxy glass-fibre composites were toughened using carboxyl-terminated butadiene-acrylonitrile (CTBN) which forms micron-sized rubber particles and 20 nm-diameter silica nanoparticles. The toughening mechanisms were identified as cavitation of rubber particles and debonding for the silica nanoparticles, followed by plastic void growth. The CTBN greatly increases GIC, and the nanoparticles increase Gth. Combining both particles as a hybrid has a synergistic effect on the fatigue resistance. This demonstrates the effectiveness of hybrid toughening, enabling the design of optimised composites by combining micro- and nanoparticles.
Date Issued
2018-06-01
Date Acceptance
2018-02-18
Citation
Composites Part A: Applied Science and Manufacturing, 2018, 109 (1), pp.239-256
ISSN
1359-835X
Publisher
Elsevier
Start Page
239
End Page
256
Journal / Book Title
Composites Part A: Applied Science and Manufacturing
Volume
109
Issue
1
Copyright Statement
© 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. This manuscript is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Identifier
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1359835X18300691
Subjects
Science & Technology
Technology
Engineering, Manufacturing
Materials Science, Composites
Engineering
Materials Science
Glass fibres
Nanoparticles
Fatigue
Fracture
I INTERLAMINAR FRACTURE
MODE-I
MECHANICAL-PROPERTIES
EPOXY NANOCOMPOSITES
NANO-PARTICLES
PART 2
TOUGHNESS
DELAMINATION
IMPROVEMENT
MORPHOLOGY
Materials
0901 Aerospace Engineering
0912 Materials Engineering
0913 Mechanical Engineering
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2018-03-03