Construction

and Building
Construction and Building Materials 20 (2006) 673678

MATERIALS
www.elsevier.com/locate/conbuildmat

Fracture and exural characterization of natural

ber-reinforced polymer concrete
J.M.L. Reis

UFF Universidade Federal Fluminense, Programa de Pos-Graduacao em Engenharia Mecanica, LMTA Laboratorio de Mecanica
Teorica e Aplicada, Rua Passo da Patria 156, Bloco E, sala 216, 24210-240 Niteroi, Rio de Janeiro, Brasil
Received 28 September 2004; received in revised form 11 February 2005; accepted 13 February 2005
Available online 8 April 2005

Abstract
Mechanical characterization of epoxy polymer concrete reinforced with natural bers is investigated in this work to analyze the
possibility of substitution by synthetic bers. These natural bers studied are coconut, sugar cane bagasse, and banana bers. All of
these bers come from their specic products after they have been used, i.e. as recycle. As the natural bers are agriculture waste,
manufacturing natural product is, therefore, an economic and interesting option. The main idea is to use the bers like they come
from nature without any kind of preparation.
The comparison between epoxy polymer concrete reinforced with natural bers, unreinforced and reinforced with synthetic bers
is made. A brief description of how the natural bers are obtained and manufacturing process of polymer concrete is also made.
 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Natural ber; Polymer concrete; Fracture

1. Introduction
Human beings have always been remarkably adaptable working with the materials around them to make
whatever is required. Wood, grasses, clay and stone
have all been used as they occur naturally, but mans
ability to process natural resources has improved in parallel with mans own development. While ring clay to
make pottery and bricks might have once been considered advanced, this feat hardly compares with smelting
bronze and iron, them producing steel, aluminium, polymers and composites.
But although we continue to develop ever more
sophisticated materials, in some respects it is very dicult to replicate the properties found in natural materials. Furthermore, there is an increasing interest in
what happens to products at the end of their useful lives,
*

Tel.: +552 126295588.

E-mail address: jreis@mec.u.br.

0950-0618/$ - see front matter  2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.conbuildmat.2005.02.008

so natural materials have an advantage in that they can

biodegrade or be burnt in a carbon-neutral manner.
The use of natural bers as reinforcement to polymer
concrete is a way to recycle these bers and produce a
high strength materials [1]. Amongst the advantages of
these bers are: renewable, non-abrasive, cheaper, abundance and show less concern with health and safety during handling and processing.
Polymer concrete (PC) is a concrete-like composite,
in which a resin binder, in this case epoxy resin, substitutes the cement binder. The composition of PC is determined by its applications and is used very eciently in
precast components. Although some of the assumptions
in linear elastic fracture mechanics and elasticplastic
fracture mechanics are incorrect for particle-lled polymer composites, cement concrete and mortar, many attempts have been made to characterize the crack
behaviour of these materials [2,3]. Because of rapid setting and high strength properties, polymer concrete are
being used in a variety of construction, rehabilitation

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J.M.L. Reis / Construction and Building Materials 20 (2006) 673678

and repair applications such as bridges, pipelines and

other types of constructions [4,5].
In this study, chopped coconut, sugar cane bagasse
and banana bers were added to the matrix in order
to improve the mechanical behavior of PC. The fracture
properties studied were according to the two parameter
model (TPM) of RILEMs reports. Previous work [6,7]
with short carbon and glass bers reinforcement showed
that epoxy polymer concrete has increase its mechanical
and fracture properties when reinforced with synthetic
bers compared to unreinforced epoxy polymer
concrete.

2. Experimental program
2.1. Reinforcement bers
2.1.1. Coconut ber
Coconut ber is obtained from the brous husk
(mesocarp) of the coconut (Cocos nucifera) from the
coconut palm, which belongs to the palm family (Palmae). Coconut ber, called coir, can be extracted simply
soaking the husk in water or, alternatively, by using
mechanical process [8].
Coconut ber has a high lignin content and thus a
low cellulose content, as a result of which it is resilient,
strong and highly durable. The remarkable lightness of
the bers is due to the cavities arising from the dried
out sieve cells [1,9].
Coconut ber contains a high lignin ratio that makes
bers stier and tougher, high air porosity (95%), heat
retardant, biodegradable and considered as a renewable
source.
2.1.2. Sugar cane bagasse
Sugarcane rening generates a large volume of residue called bagasse. Disposal of bagasse is critical for
both agricultural protability and environmental protection.
The sugarcane stalk consists of two parts: an inner
pith containing most of the sucrose and an outer rind
with lignocellulosic bers. During rening, the sugarcane stalk is crushed to extract the sucrose. This procedure produces a large volume of residue, bagasse,
containing both crushed rind and pith bers.
Previous research on bagasse has suggested many approaches to converting bagasse into value-added industrial products, such as liquid fuels, feedstocks, enzymes
and activated carbon. Use of bagasse ber for manufacturing material products is another prospective solution.
Compared to pure synthetic materials, bagasse berbased materials have two advantageous features, light
weight and renewability.
Waste bagasse is manually sifted and put into an
alkaline solution for boiling to remove lignin. After

the treatment, bagasse ber is rinsed with water and

dried in an electric oven.
2.1.3. Banana ber
Banana ber, the cellulosic bers obtained from the
pseudo-stem of banana plant (Musa sepientum) is a bast
ber with relatively good mechanical properties.
The banana plant, often erroneously referred to as a
tree, is a large herb, with succulent, very juicy stem
(properly pseudostem) which is a cylinder of leafpetiole sheaths, reaching a height of 67.5 m and arising
from a eshy rhizome or corm.
Plants are large, herbaceous monocots, reaching
7.5 m in some cultivars. The trunk or pseudostem is
not a true stem, but only the clustered, cylindrical aggregation of leaf stalk bases.
The mechanical properties of the natural bers studied are presented in Table 1. Table 1 shows average values.
2.2. Binder formulations
Polymer concrete formulations were prepared by
mixing foundry sand with epoxy resin. Resin content
was 20% by weight and no ller was added in both formulations.
The epoxy resin system was eposil 551 (SILICEM),
based on a diglycidyl ether of bisphenol A and an aliphatic amine hardener. This system has low viscosity
and is processed with a maximum mix ratio to the hardener of 2:1.
Foundry sand was a siliceous one, with very uniform
grain and a mean diameter, d50, of 342 lm. The sand
was previously dried before being added to the polymeric resins in an automatic mixer. Polymer concrete
fracture specimens were mixed and compacted in a steel
mold of dimensions of 30 60 280 mm and exural
specimens were mixed and compacted in a steel mold
of dimensions according 40 40 160 mm to RILEM
standard TC-113/PC2 [10]. All the specimens were allowed to cure, for seven days at room temperature and
then post-cured at 80 C for 4 h.
Waste coconut, sugar cane bagasse and banana
pseudostem bers are manually sifted, rinsed with water
and dried in an electric oven. There was not any kind of
pre-treatment on the bers, they were used as recycled

Table 1
Mechanical properties of natural bers
Properties

Coconut
[8]

Sugar cane
bagasse [8]

Banana
[10]

Diameter (mm)
Tensile strength (MPa)
Modulus of elasticity (GPa)
Elongation (%)

0.10.4
174
1926
1025

0.20.4
170290
1519
NA

0.154
384
2051
5.2

J.M.L. Reis / Construction and Building Materials 20 (2006) 673678

waste. The bers were chopped and blended in the polymer in concrete mix by 2% of the total weight. Natural
bers mechanical properties are presented in Table 1.
2.3. Testing procedures
To perform fracture tests, a close-loop servo control
machine was used in order to make possible stable tests.
To measure the crack mouth opening displacement
(CMOD), a clip gauge attached to knife edges glued to
the specimen was connected to a data acquisition system
in order to record the tests results, see Fig. 1.
The method used to perform the fracture mechanic
tests was the two parameter fracture model (TPFM)
[12,13] which proposes the critical stress intensity factor,
KIc, and the critical crack tip opening displacement
CTODC as material fracture parameters. According to
this RILEM proposal [11,12], only one size three point
bending specimen is needed for measure the KIc and
CTODC. A decomposition of CMOD is done due to
non-linear eect [9].
The critical opening displacement of the original precrack tip, CTODC, is calculated from the maximum load
registered and the value of the eective critical crack
length, which is the initial notch depth plus the stable
crack growth at peak load.
This was also determined by means of three-point
bend tests according to the RILEM TC89-FMT (fracture mechanics of concrete-test methods) recommendation for determination of the fracture toughness of
concrete [14]. The fracture toughness KIc is calculated
using the equation:
1=2

K Ic 3P max 0:5 W

Spac F a
;
2d 2 b

in which
F a

1:99  a1  a2:15  3:93a 2:7a2

q
;
3=2
p1=2 1 2a1  a

675

Another fracture parameter studied is the fracture energy, Gf. This was determined by means of three-point
bend tests according to the RILEM TC50-FMC (fracture mechanics of concrete) recommendation for determination of the fracture energy of concrete [7]. The
beam specimen used in this study is shown in Fig. 1
and the fracture energy Gf of the polymer concrete can
be calculated by the following equation:
Gf

W 0 mgdmax
;
Alig

where W0 is the area under the loaddeection curve

(N m), mg is the self-weight of the specimen between
supports (kg), dmax is the maximum displacement (m),
and Alig is the fracture area [d(b  a)] (m2); b and d
are the height and width of the beam, respectively; a is
the depth of the notch.
The three-point bending tests were performed in a
mechanical testing machine (displacement controlled
type), at a crosshead movement rate of 1 mm/min,
according to the RILEM norm TC-113/PCM-8 [15].
Despite the very short span length compared with
specimen thickness, shear eect is disregarded and it is
not considered. Mortar is assumed as an isotropic material and the theory of plane cross-sections is used. Flexural strength, considered as the strength under normal
stresses, was determined by applying the following equation known from the strength of materials:
rf

3Pl
;
2bh2

where rf is the exural strength; P is the maximum load

recorded; l is the span length; and b and h are, respectively, the width and the height of the prismatic specimens.
The exural and fracture tests set-up are presented in
Fig. 1.

where a is the ac/d, Pmax, the measured maximum load

[N], W = W0S/L[N], and W0 is the self-weight of the
beam [N].

3. Tests results and discussion

The tests results according to RILEM standard
[1215] are presented in Tables 25. Table 2 presents
the unreinforced epoxy polymer concrete tests results

Fig. 1. Flexural and fracture tests set-up.

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J.M.L. Reis / Construction and Building Materials 20 (2006) 673678

Table 2
Unreinforced epoxy polymer concrete
Epoxy specimens

p
KIc MPa m

1
2
3
4
5

2.002
2.039
2.207
2.323
2.214

Average
Standard deviation
COV (%)
CI (95%)

2.157
0.13346722
6.19
0.11159912

Table 3
Coconut ber-reinforced polymer concrete tests result
p
Coconut specimens
KIc MPa m
1
2
3
4
5
Average
Standard deviation
COV (%)
CI (95%)

2.339
2.680
2.913
2.319
2.228
2.496
0.28963201
11.60
0.24217689

Table 4
Sugar cane bagasse-reinforced polymer concrete tests results
p
Bagasse specimens
KIc MPa m
1
2
3
4
5

2.468
2.663
2.692
2.429
2.452

Average
Standard deviation
COV (%)
CI (95%)

2.541
0.125975
4.96
0.10533447

Table 5
Banana pseudostem ber-reinforced polymer concrete tests results
p
Banana specimens
KIc MPa m
1
2
3
4
5

1.668
1.412
1.863
1.735
1.712

Average
Standard deviation
COV (%)
CI (95%)

1.678
0.16544334
9.86
0.13833608

used as reference values to compare to natural berreinforced polymer concrete. Table 3 shows coconut ber-reinforced polymer concrete results, Table 4 displays

CTOD (mm)

Gf (N/m)

rf (MPa)

8.206
9.361
7.542
8.575
9.205

35.813
33.133
33.610
33.422
35.448

0.014
0.00673053
49.49
0.00562776

8.578
0.74463192
8.68
0.62262679

34.285
1.24648012
3.64
1.04224905

CTOD (mm)

Gf (N/m)

rf (MPa)

18.901
16.577
20.647
14.918
14.772

41.841
44.030
42.282
43.454
42.876

17.163
2.56218666
14.93
2.14238204

42.896
0.8785982
2.05
0.7346432

0.025
0.011
0.010
0.008
0.014

0.026
0.017
0.034
0.026
0.036
0.028
0.00756307
27.21
0.00632389

CTOD (mm)
0.017
0.014
0.016
0.014
0.013
0.015
0.00164317
11.10
0.00137394

CTOD (mm)
0.035
0.031
0.029
0.023
0.027
0.029
0.00447214
15.42
0.00373939

Gf (N/m)

rf (MPa)

9.764
11.038
9.673
9.752
9.506

35.260
36.492
35.234
35.654
34.728

9.946
0.61873888
6.22
0.51736085

35.474
0.65738786
1.85
0.54967734

Gf (N/m)

rf (MPa)

11.550
11.672
15.348
13.805
12.156

30.151
25.432
27.721
23.367
28.741

12.096
1.63520311
12.67
1.36728124

27.082
2.69736386
9.96
2.25541096

the tests results from sugar cane bagasse ber reinforcement and Table 5 represents the polymer concrete reinforced with pseudostem banana ber tests results. The

J.M.L. Reis / Construction and Building Materials 20 (2006) 673678

results are presents with the statistical calculations from

the experimental results.
Fig. 2 shows a fracture toughness comparison graph
between all the natural bers studied.
The fracture toughness of unreinforced and synthetic
reinforced epoxy polymer concrete is compared to the
natural ber-reinforced polymer concrete.
Coconut ber-reinforced polymer concrete fracture
toughness and fracture energy are higher than the others
natural bers reinforcement studied and higher than
unreinforced epoxy polymer concrete. Tests results
showed similar fracture and exural to carbon ber reinforcement [6,7]. An increase in the stress intensity factor,
KIc, of 15.7% with coconut reinforcement and 17.8%
increasement for sugar cane bagasse reinforcement is
observed when compared to unreinforced polymer concrete. A 22.2% decrease is derived from banana pseudostem ber reinforcement.
Fig. 3 displays the graph where the fracture energy is
calculated according to Eq. (3) and RILEM specications [14].
The fracture energy, Gf, of natural ber-reinforced
polymer concrete displays a notable increase when com-

Fig. 2. Load vs. CMOD natural ber reinforcement comparison.

677

Fig. 4. Natural ber three-point bending comparison.

pared to unreinforced PC. A superb 100.8% increasement is obtained when coconut ber is used as
reinforcement and 15.9% and 41.1% increasement is observed for sugar cane bagasse and banana pseudostem
ber, respectively. All these results are directly compared to the results printed in Table 2.
Fracture energy that is absorbed during crack propagation in ber-reinforced materials is provided mainly
by the following mechanisms: matrix cracking, ber rupture, ber/matrix interface debonding and ber pull-out.
The ber reinforcement become crack propagation slow
and, therefore, higher fracture energy, explaining the results from ber-reinforced polymer concrete.
The three-point bending tests results of natural berreinforced polymer concrete are plotted in Fig. 4.
The exural results from coconut ber-reinforced
polymer concrete are higher than the others natural ber
polymer concrete and an increase is also observed when
compared to unreinforced polymer concrete. An
increasement of 25.1% is the result of coconut ber reinforcement when exural strength is analysed. The result
of sugar cane bagasse is a slight increase of 3.5% and
banana pseudostem ber reinforcement decrease 21%
compared to unreinforced polymer concrete.
Comparing the results obtained from the tests performed with previous work done using synthetic bers
(carbon and glass) shows that coconut ber displays a
similar result to carbon when used as reinforcement in
the same proportions [6,7] and bagasse displays similar
results to glass ber reinforcement [6,7].

4. Conclusions

Fig. 3. Natural ber fracture energy test results.

In this study, the eect of chopped natural ber content on fracture and exural behavior of the polymer
composites were investigated and the following conclusions were derived:

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J.M.L. Reis / Construction and Building Materials 20 (2006) 673678

1. Chopped coconut ber and sugar cane bagasse ber

increase the fracture properties both fracture toughness and fracture energy of polymer concrete.
2. The reinforcement with banana pseudostem ber
does not increase the fracture toughness of polymer
concrete, only the fracture energy has an increasement in the result.
3. Coconut ber reinforcement displays a slight increase
in the exural properties of epoxy polymer concrete
when compared to unreinforced and reinforced with
synthetic bers like glass and carbon [6,7].
4. The exural strength of polymer concrete decrease
when reinforced with sugar cane bagasse and banana
pseudostem ber, making the polymer composite
weak.
Coconut ber proves to be an excellent reinforcement
for polymer concrete increasing the fracture and exural
results. Sugar cane bagasse proves to be an alternative
when fracture properties are analysed. Banana pseudostem ber is not a good choice for polymer concrete
reinforcement.

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]
[6]

[7]

[8]
[9]

[10]

[11]

Acknowledgement
The support of Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Cientco e Tecnologico, CNPq, under Post Doctoral scholarship is gratefully acknowledged.

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