ICAMB 2012, Jan 9-11, 2012

Impact behavior of Nano composite laminates under low velocities

A.Thiagarajan, K.Palaniradja and M.Saravanan

Abstract This paper presents experimental investigations on

impact resistance of glass fiber-reinforced epoxy nano composites. The laminates are prepared using 6 layers of glass woven roving mates of 610gsm and nano clay content varied from 0%, 1%, 3% and 5% by weight with respect to matrix material. The composite panels were submitted to low-velocity impact tests with energy of 18 J. The methodology used for the impact test is based on the ASTM D3029 standard. During these impact tests, the time-histories, Peak load and energy at maxi load were recorded by load cell. The incorporation of 1% and 3% of nanoclay lead to more stiffness and higher energy absorption. Damages produced on the front and back surfaces of impact were also observed and compared neat epoxy laminates.

Keywords Composites, Glass fibre, Low velocity impact,

Nanoclay

I. INTRODUCTION LASS fiber reinforced composites are widely used in the aviation and automotive industry due to their advantageous characteristics, mainly weight reduction, which is one of the most important design parameters for such applications. Due to completely different material specifications between metals and composites, the impact behavior of structures made by these materials is inherently different. Metals show visible damage caused by impact mainly on the surface of structures, while damage is hidden inside composite structure especially when subjected to low velocity impact [1]. Luo et al. [2] the damage in composite structures resulting from impact events is one of the most important aspects to be considered in the design and applications of composite materials. Abrate [3] also made a comprehensive review of all the literature available from 1989 to the present to give the view of latest developments in the study on low velocity impact of composite material. He observed that damage induced by impact consisted of fiber breakage, matrix cracking and delamination. The damage induced by low energy impact is often a complex mixture consisting of interlaminar fracture (delamination), intralaminar fracture (transverse matrix cracking and debonding between
F. A.Thiagarajan, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Pondicherry Engineering College, Puduherry-605014, India. (corresponding author phone: +919092608765; fax: (0413) 2655101; e-mail: thiagu_ami@yahoo.co.in). S. K.Palaniradja, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Pondicherry Engineering College, Puduherry-605014, India. (e-mail: palaniradja72@pec.edu). T. M. Saravanan, Department of Mechanical Engineering, V.R.S College of Engineering and Technology, Arasur-607107, India. (e-mail: ultimate_saro@yahoo.co.in).

fibre and matrix) and fibre fracture. The effects of impactor mass and velocity on damage in woven fabric composites were studied by Cantwell and Morton [4] have documented efforts over the past two decades specifically to understand the behavior of laminated composite structures under transient loading conditions. These efforts were (1) to identify and characterize the relevant failure mechanisms, (2) to understand their interactions, and (3) to be able to predict the extent of damage within a given composite system under a set of specified loading conditions. The impact event itself is also defined by many variables such as impactor and target geometries, impact speed and energy [5]. Naik et al. [6] found that for a given incident impact energy, the damage tolerance of plain weave E-glassepoxy laminates is higher for lowmass, high-velocity combinations and lower for low-velocity, high-mass combinations. Sonparote and Lakkad [7] used glasscarbon hybrids with various proportions of glass and carbon fiber volume contents and determined flexural, impact and interlaminar properties. Nano particles make a better inter phase property than the fibers in which the inter phase properties affects the damping character of a composite. The nanocomposites containing organoclay have been further employed as the matrix material to produce hybrid nanoclay/fibre reinforced polymer composites that possess improve the mechanical and fracture properties [8], [9]. From the literature it has been found that nanoclay provides better properties to the composite and clay filled composites show competitive mechanical and vibration damping properties to fiber reinforced composites. This paper focus on the effect of nanoclay dispersed into an epoxy/fiber glass composite and its influence on impact response at low-velocity impact tests. Square laminates of size 150 mm were subjected to low-velocity impact loading using an instrumented falling dart impact testing system at energy level of 18J, four samples were tested. Details of the impact response in terms of key impact parameters like peak load and absorbed energy were studied. II. EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURES A. Nanocomposites synthesis The materials used for this investigation is nanoclay, epoxy resin and E- glass fiber. The epoxy system was made of Diglycidyl ether of Bisphenol-A in the trade name of LY 556 and the curing agent is Tri-ethylene tetra amine of HY 951 bought from Hunstman Inc. The nanoclay used in this research was organic modified montmorillonite bought from Southern Clay Inc in the trade of Garamite-1958, while the glass fiber 15

ICAMB 2012, Jan 9-11, 2012 has a woven roving mat (WRM) with density of 610 gsm. The amount of nanoclay exfoliated into the epoxy system, in weight of 1%, 3% and 5% respectively. The nanocomposite synthesis is carry out by two different steps, in the first step the nano clay is mixed with epoxy resin then exfoliation process can be done by high shear mixing with the help of laboratory stirrer. Then 10% of hardener was mixed with the epoxy resinclay mixture by weight. The nanocomposites laminates is prepared by hand lay-up techniques. The laminate was cut into 150 mm x 150 mm square specimen for drop weight impact test. B. Falling Drop Weight impact Test The impact resistance on the nano composites laminate is performed by falling drop weight. The laminates were fixed horizontally on the drop-weight fixture and drop height in these experiments was 750 mm, thus giving impact energy of 18 J. The energy was calculated using the equation E = mgh, where E is the impact energy, m is the mass of the impactor, g is the acceleration due to gravity, and h is the drop height. The impactor was made up of hardened steel, and their shapes were cylindrical with hemispherical nose. The impactor was attached to the circular discs of mass of 2.5 kg, which were dropped. Falling weight impact test equipment setup is shown in Fig. 1. The dart material used was steel. Standard equipment is used in order to collect and store the signal from a load cell positioned in the proximity of the head of the dart. uniformly dispersed throughout the matrix. Epoxy with 5 % nanoclay at lower magnification shows agglomerated structure and the dispersion of the agglomerated particles throughout the matrix. This agglomerated structure shows that at higher concentration the nanoclay dispersion is difficult in the matrix medium.

(a)

(b) Fig. 2 SEM micrographs of (a) 3 and (b) 5% nanoclay B. Impact response To be able to understand the impact response of nano composites low velocity impact tests were performed. The energies employed were enough to cause damage ranging from a barely visible delamination and perforation. Loadtime curves from the impact testing are shown in Fig. 4. These show that the time the striker was in contact with the impacted specimens is longer for 3 % of nanoclay sample. When the test coupons were subjected to energy of 18J, the forcetime curve was linear up to the laminates fail. The peak load values for 0, 1, 3 and 5 % nanoclay reinforced specimens were 1478, 1520, 2200 and 1335 N respectively (Fig. 3).

Fig.1 Falling weight impact testing machine

III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION A. Microstructure of nanocomposites Scanning electron microcoscope (SEM) is a straight forward technique to visualize the dispersion of nanoparticles within matrix and to study the structure of nanocomposites (intercalation/exfoliation). SEM pictures of Epoxy/ nanoclay were represented in Fig. 2. A homogeneous dispersion of nanoparticles is clearly visible, although some small agglomerates present in the matrix medium. Fig. 2(a) shows that the dispersion of nanoclay in the matrix is random and

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ICAMB 2012, Jan 9-11, 2012 In 5% laminates the energy value drops to 15 J. Several authors have reported that as the nano weight fraction increase, the wettability of fibre with resin decreases and weak interfacial bonding potentially occurs.

Fig. 3 Load vs Nanoclay contents

(b)

(a)

(d)

(c) Fig. 4 Load vs Time (a) neat epoxy, (b) 1, (c) 3 and (d) 5 % nanoclay Absorbed energy is the energy at the peak load deducted from the total energy. As the composite materials are brittle in nature, it is assumed here that the energy up to the peak load is absorbed through elastic deformation and all the energy that is absorbed beyond that is assumed to be absorbed through the creation of damages [9]. The absorbed energy for 0 .1, 3 and 5 % was 16, 16.85, 18.25 and 15 J; the absorbed energy was linearly increase with the addition of nanoclay contents Fig. 5. Fig. 5 Absorbed energy vs Nanoclay content C. Damage evaluation The fragmentation characteristics of fiber reinforced epoxy nano composite collapsed very seriously with both fiber cracks and separation from matrix. Fig. 6 represents the damaged

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ICAMB 2012, Jan 9-11, 2012 specimens of neat and nanoclay at the energy of 18 J. For 0 % specimens, there is an approximately 12 mm round

Fig. 6 Front and back face of impacted samples damaged in the front face and approximately 30 mm round damaged area in the back face and debonding occur on the surface. While, for 1% sample a round damage found in front face which is approximately 10 mm and back face damage is 20 mm and full penetration is not occur. For sample 3% and 5 % specimen there is an approximately 10 mm round damaged in the front face and approximately 15 mm round damaged area in the back face. Apart from 3% and 5 % nanoclay specimens, all other specimens exhibit extensive matrix cracking, debonding, delamination and fibre breakage in the middle of their face. The impactor did not penetrate on the specimens for 3 and 5 % of nanoclay. The reason is that the stiffness of these composites laminate is greater than the 0 % specimen. It is evident that for these nanoclay specimens, the damage area is reduced and the specimen is not perforated fully on back face. From the experimental result it shows that the nanoclay samples sustain maximum load and good damage resistance. IV. CONCLUSION The nanocomposites laminate was successfully prepared and the impact response was observed using drop weight impact test. The effect of nanoclay addition to fiber glass/epoxy nano composites was investigated. Scanning electron microscopy observation proven that the 3% of nanoclay is fully exfoliated structures and uniformly dispersed into the epoxy system. Low velocity impact test was performed 18

ICAMB 2012, Jan 9-11, 2012 with the energy of 18 J. From the results, the following conclusions can be highlighted. i. Incorporation of nanoclay into the matrix lowered the impact damage size compared with neat epoxy laminates. ii. With up to 3 wt% of nanoclay in the matrix, the impact resistances of the laminate were improved in term of higher load and energy absorption. iii. From the stiffness point of view, an average increase of 32.8% was observed with the addition of the 3 % of nanoclay. The results show the addition of clay improves the impact strength and also controls the damage of the laminate. iv. The weak fiber/matrix interfacial bonding and agglomeration was the reason for this reduction of impact strength for 5% nanoclay sample.
K. Luo, E.R. Green and C.J. Morrison. Impact damage analysis of composite plates. Int J Impact Egg, Vol. 22(5), 1999, Pp. 435447. [3] S. Abrate. Impact on laminated composite materials. Appl Mech Rev, Vol. 44(4), 1991, pp. 155190. [4] WJ .Cantwell and J. Morton. Geometrical effects in the low velocity response of CFRP. Compos Struct, Vol. 1, 1989, pp. 3960. [5] AP. Christoforou. Impact dynamics and damage in composite structures. Compos Struct, Vol. 52, 2001, pp. 181188. [6] NK. Naik, SV. Borade, H. Arya, M. Sailendra and SV. Prabhu. Experimental studies on impact behaviour of Woven fabric composites effect of impact parameter. J Reinf Plast Compos. Vol. 21(15), 2002, pp. 13471362. [7] PW .Sonparote and SC. Lakkad. Mechanical properties of carbon/ glass fibre reinforced hybrids. Fiber Sci Technol, Vol.16, 1982 pp.309312. [8] JF. Timmerman, B. Hayes and JC. Seferis. Nanoclay reinforcement effects on the cryogenic micro cracking of carbon fiber/epoxy composites. Compos Sci Technol, Vol. 62, 2002, pp. 12491258. [9] NA. Siddiqui, RSC. Woo, JK. Kim, CCK. Leung and A. Munir. Mode I interlaminar fracture behavior and mechanical properties of CFRPs with nanoclay-filled epoxy matrix. Composites: Part A, Vol. 38, 2007, pp. 449460. [10] Mahesh V. Hosur , Kunal Jain. Low-velocity impact response of carbon/epoxy laminates subjected to colddry and coldmoist conditioning. Compos Struct, Vol. 79. 2007, pp. 300311. [2]

REFERENCES
[1] WJ. Cantwell and J. Morton. The impact resistance of composite materials a review. Compos Struct, Vol. 22(5), 1991, pp.347362.

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