Mechanical Properties of Glass Fiber/ Basalt Fiber Reinforced
Polypropylene Hybrid Composites Fabricated by the DFFIM Process
YU Lichao1, YAN Xiaofei1, CUI Zhenjin1, CHU Mengfei2, YANG Yuqiu2,
Hiroyuki Hamada1
1:Kyoto Institute of Technology, Matsugasaki, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto, 606-8585, Japan
2:Key Laboratory of Textile Science &Technology, Ministry of Education, College of
Textiles, Donghua University, Shanghai, 201620,china
Abstract
The direct fiber feeding injection molding
(DFFIM) process is a kind of new ways which the
thermoplastic material is injected with continuous
fiber and molded in one operation. The objective
of this research is to investigate the mechanical
performances of Glass Fiber/ Basalt Fiber
Reinforced Polypropylene Hybrid Composites. In
this work, the hybrid composites were
manufactured by DFFIM Process, where GFPP
pellets were used as basic reinforcements system,
continuous basalt fiber strands were used as
hybrid fibers, and the PA6 and MAPP were used
as coupling agent during fabrication. Mechanical
testing like tensile test were carried out to
investigate the hybrid effect. Optical microscope
observation was taken to measure and count the
fiber length. Scanning electron microscope
observation of cross section was used to analysis
the combination of fiber and resin. The result
shows that the reinforcement of Basalt fibers and
Glass fibers hybrid composites significantly
influencing on the mechanical properties of the
composites, and it’s found that the addition of
PA6 and MAPP could also improve the
mechanical properties of the GFPP/BF hybrid
composites to some extent.
1. INTRODUCTION
The incorporation of two or more fibers into a
single matrix further enhanced the properties of
the composite materials. Glass fibers are widely
used as the reinforcement agents for plastics,
which provide high strength and stiffness. New
perspectives have arisen on basalt fiber
applications due to the potential low cost of this
material together with its good mechanical
performance, in particular at high temperature.
These good properties suggest possible
application of basalt fibers in fields where glass
composites are nowadays largely applied. The
idea to fill these fibers into a polymer matrix is
relatively recent and could offer very interesting
perspectives that have not yet been sufficiently
investigated. In this work, with the principal aim
of evaluating the mechanical property of glass
fiber and basalt fiber reinforced polypropylene
hybrid composites fabricated by the direct fiber
feeding injection molding (DFFIM) Process,
mechanical tests were carried out on 5 kinds
comparable of glass fiber/ basalt fiber hybrid
composites.
DFFIM process is a kind of new ways which
the thermoplastic material is injected with
continuous fiber and molded in one operation.
DFFIM process means that continuous fiber were
directly guided into the barrel of injection
molding machine through the designed vent hole
and continues fiber fed into the melt polymer by
the shearing motion of the screw of injection
molding machine during plasticization process.
Thus the fiber attrition in the processing of
extrusion compounding could be avoided and
fiber length is theoretically longer than normal
injection molding process.
2. EXPERIMENTAL DETAILS
2.1. Materials
The pre-compounded glass fiber
polypropylene pellet (25 wt. % content) was
supplied by Sumitomo Chemical Co., Ltd, Japan.
Basalt fiber filament were purchased from used as
hybrid fiber. Polyamide 6 (PA6) (Grade:
A1030BRL, Unitika Co., Ltd, Japan) and Maleic
anhydride-grafted polypropylene (MAPP with
5wt.% maleic anhydride, Polytack H-1000P,
IDEMITSU Kosan Co., Ltd., Japan) were used as
coupling agent.
2.2. Fabrication of Composites
The Basalt fiber/Glass fiber reinforced
polypropylene hybrid composites were fabricated
using DFFIM method. The continuous basalt
fiber strands were guided into the vented hole of
the devolatilizing unit and fed into the melt by the
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shearing action of the screw during plasticization 2.4 Tensile test
process as shown in Figure 1. The tensile test is generally performed in a
universal testing machine (Instron 55R4206) and
test was done as per ASTM D638 standards.

2.5 Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM)

Fig.1 Schematic of direct fiber feeding injection Fractography examination for the failure
molding process (DFFIM) specimens were observed using Scanning
Electron Microscope, JEOL model 6390. The
The glass fiber pellets were added into feeding surface of the fractured specimens under Tensile,
unit by mixing 5% PA6 and 4% MAPP. All Flexural and Impact tests was examined with
specimens were injected into dumbbell-shaped
different magnifications
bars by 75 tons injection machine. The thickness
and width of the specimens are 4 mm and 10 mm.
Material fabricated design was shown in Table 1. 3. RESULT AND DISCUSSION
Screw speed of injection unit was fixed at 180
rpm. The injection temperature was set at 200-
270 ℃ with 60 ℃ cooling temperature and 20 3.1 Fiber length
second cooling time. The statistical results of fiber length are
shown in the Figure 3. The result shows that the
Table 1 Material fabricated design distribution of virgin glass fiber length is uniform.
After the basalt filament was fed into injection
Code Composition machine, the basalt fiber strands was broken into
short fibers by the screw, but the distribution of
B0 GF/PP those short basalt fibers is uneven, which was in
B1 GF/PP + BF × 1 the range of 0.74mm to 1.92mm. After feeding
two continuous basalt fiber strands, the average
B2-0 GF/PP + BF × 2
length of basalt fiber becomes shorter, that’s
B2-1 GF/PP + BF × 2 + 5% PA6 because the increase in the number of fiber fed
B2-2 GF/PP + BF × 2 + 4% MAPP will increases the friction between the fibers, and
then lead to serious damage between the fibers.
B2-3 GF/PP +BF × 2 + 5%PA6+4% MAPP However, the increase in the amount of basalt
The mass fraction of hybrid composites were fiber has little effect on the length of glass fibers
tested by Ignition loss method tested by Thermal due to its own length is relatively short.
gravimetric analyzer (TGA), and the results were
presented in Table 2.
Table 3 The average length and length
distribution of Glass fiber and Basalt fiber
Table 2 The mass fraction of hybrid composites
Main Length Average Length
Code GF BF Matrix /mm /mm

B0 24.92% - 75.08% GF BF GF BF

B1 20.37% 18.45% 61.18% B0 0.22-0.74 - 0.42 -

B2-0 16.74% 32.99% 50.27% B1 0.34-0.78 0.74-1.92 0.56 1.79

B2-1 14.43% 31.62% 53.95% B2 0.41-0.82 0.32-0.75 0.41 0.91

B2-2 15.06% 31.91% 53.03%

B2-3 13.66% 29.30% 57.04%

2.3 Fiber length measurement

The specimens were cut into pieces and burned
in the muffle furnace under 600 ℃ for 6 hours,
and then the residual fibers was observed and
marked under the optical microscope, and the
fiber length was measured and counted.
(a) Length distribution of basalt fibers

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(b) Length distribution of glass fibers
Fig. 3 The length distribution of GF and BF
3.2 Tensile Properties
The tensile properties of hybrid composites
were illustrated in Figures 4.
(a) Tensile modulus comparison
(b) Tensile strength comparison
Fig. 4 Tensile properties of hybrid composites
The results show that the tensile modulus of
GF/PP composite hybrid one continuous basalt
fiber strands was higher than that of hybrid no
basalt fibers compared with B1 and B0, it’s
because basalt fibers have higher elastic modulus
and longer length than ordinary glass fiber, and
thus the tensile modulus increases with the
increase of the volume content of basalt fiber
compared the tensile modulus of B2-0 and B1.
However, the opposites happens in the case of
tensile strength, the strength decreased with the
increase of the volume fraction of basalt fiber
base on the comparison between B0, B1 and B2-
0. It’s because basalt fibers as bundles rather than
dispersed fibers existed in the composite as
reinforcement according to Figure 5, that means
the more basalt fiber added by DIFFM method,
the worse interface was formed, thus the bad
tensile strength was achieved.
Compared with specimen B2-1 and B2-2, the
tensile strength of B2-2 was found to be 7.99%
greater than the B2-1, it shows that the addition
of PA6 contributes to the improvement of tensile
strength of BF/GF/PP hybrid composites.
Fig. 5 Cross section observation of failure
specimen
It’s found that the strength of B2-2 is 22.39%
higher than B2-0, the result indicates MAPP
could improve the tensile strength of BF/GF/PP
hybrid composite significantly, the increase
might be attributed to the formation of chemical
bounds between PP and glass fiber / basalt fiber.
The greatest improvement in tensile
performance occurs in the comparison between
B2-0 and B2-3, of the two the latter is 32.52%
higher than the former in tensile strength, it’s
because MAPP could effectively improve the
compatible of PP and PA6 so that made them
better mixed together in the blending system.
Besides, MAPP could make the combination of
resin and fiber surface more solid, as shown in fig.
6, there is some resin adhered on the surface of
fibers that were drawn out in sample B2-2 and
B2-3.
(a) Cross section observation of sample B2-2
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(b) Cross section observation of sample B2-3
Fig. 6 SEM images of fracture section
4. Conclusions
The increase of basalt fiber content can
improve the tensile modulus of GFPP, and the
increase of modulus increased with the increase
of volume content of basalt fibers, while it also
reduced the tensile strength with the addition of
basalt fiber, and the higher the fiber volume
content, the lower the tensile strength.
The addition of 5% PA6 increased the tensile
strength slightly, but which is not obvious to
improve the tensile modulus.
Adding 4% MAPP could improve both the
tensile modulus and strength, and the together
addition of PA6 and MAPP increased the tensile
properties further.
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