Physical and Mechanical Behaviour of Sida acuta Fibre Reinforced Epoxy Composite at Different Fibre Loading

Sida acuta is the botanical name of the plant belonging to Malvaceae family. Sida acuta fibres are available in nature, relatively low cost and abundantly available in India. The present work has been carried out to make use of Sida acuta fibres in the fibre reinforced polymer composites. In this study the composites are made using untreated bidirectional Sida acuta stem fibre as reinforcement and commercially available epoxy resin as matrix material using hand lay-up technique. The composites are made of different fibre fabric orientation (0°/90° and ± 45°) and each fabric orientation composite with different fibre loading (0, 24, 28 and 32 wt%) are characterized for their physical and mechanical properties. The test results show the significant effect of fibre loading on the physical and mechanical properties of these composites. Also the fracture behaviour and fibre pull-out at the fracture of the composite samples have been analysed using scanning electron microscope.