Dynamic mechanical behaviour of graphene, hexagonal boron nitride reinforced carbon-kevlar, hybrid fabric-based epoxy nanocomposites

An emphasis on the development of lightweight structures in multitudes of engineering applications has broadened the scope for the continual development of fiber-reinforced composites due to their lightweight and superior strength. The current work is aimed to investigate the influence of fillers graphene and hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) on carbon, Kevlar, and hybrid fabric when they form fiber-reinforced composites. In particular, the properties such as storage modulus, loss modulus, damping factor, and glass transition temperature were determined for various composites to understand the influence of fillers, fabric combinations, and their interaction in synergy. The unique contribution of this work also lies in the inter-correlation of Full width-half Maximum (FWHM) of loss modulus (E”) plots to understand the phenomena of abrasive wear. An inhomogeneity factor based on the Cole-Cole plots termed as circularity index was also calculated by using Full Maximum (F.M.) and the FWHM. Carbon, Kevlar, and hybrid fabric mat reinforced epoxy composites, with 0.1, 0.3 & 0.5 wt% loadings of graphene and h-BN were prepared using the hand layup technique. The Dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) was performed under temperature sweep (30–200°C). The results were analysed to understand the choice of h-BN with Kevlar fabric for applications needing high damping while graphene with carbon fabric for applications needing high tenacity. A hybrid fabric mat offers a balance of damping and tenacity. It was observed that the GC2 composite showed a 49% increment in storage modulus (E’), and GK2 composites showed a 38% increment in loss modulus (E”) compared to GC0 and GK0 composites.