Experimental Investigation on the Mechanical Properties of Veli Karuvelam - Neem Hybrid Composites

Natural fibers-reinforced hybrid composites are acquiring more interest in automobile, marine, and aerospace fields due to its light weight characteristics. The purpose of this research is to develop a new material based on natural fibers for the aforementioned applications. The natural fibers such as Veli Karuvelam and Neem were selected for the investigation. As both the fibers are considered as weed in the agricultural fields, it could be a noteworthy to convert weed into useful material. Hybrid composites were fabricated using Veli Karuvelam and Neem fibers by hand layup method. Totally, five different types of composites were fabricated viz. N:V (1:0), N:V (0:1), N:V (1:3), N:V (1:1), and N:V (3:1). The fibers characteristics were analyzed by TGA and FTIR techniques. Further, the mechanical and moisture uptake behaviors of composites were investigated. TGA results showed that the Veli Karuvelam fiber possessed better thermal stability than Neem fiber. Tensile and flexural studies revealed that the N:V (0:1) composite exhibited the maximum tensile strength of 65 MPa and maximum flexural strength of 240 MPa due to the stuffing of more amount of high strength Veli Karuvelam fibers that involved in better stress transfer. Impact study resulted that the N: V (0:1) composite displayed the maximum impact energy of 6.5 kJ/m(2) owing to the better energy absorption behavior of inner structure of composite. Further, the moisture absorption study revealed that the N:V (1:0) composite absorbed more moisture compared to all other composites due to the intrinsic property of Neem fiber to hold more moisture. Furthermore, it was concluded from this research that the I:V (0:1) composite could a potential candidate for the application in automobile, marine, and aviation fields as showed better performance.