A study about hole making in woven jute fabric-reinforced polymer composites

The time has come for natural fibres to stand as potent substitutes for synthetic fibres in various industrial applications. Recently, jute fibre is being used as reinforcement material in the development of reinforced plastics for various engineering products. The production cycle of a composite product often necessitates certain degree of machining operations. Drilling is one of the most widely practised machining operation for making holes in composite laminates. Hole making is imperative to ascertain the assembly of intricate composite products. The literature available indicate that not much research work has been reported on the machining behaviour of jute fibre-reinforced polypropylene composites. Hence, in the present experimental endeavour, drilling of woven jute fabric-reinforced polypropylene composite has been performed. The effect of operating variables on thrust force and torque signals was investigated. Drilling-induced damage in the developed composite was quantified using stereo microscope. The experimental values indicate close relationship between the tool geometries and the delamination factor. SEM analysis was also conducted to understand the drilling behaviour and surface morphology of the drilled holes. Among the solid drills compared, parabolic drill reveals better cutting behaviour in terms of lower drilling forces and better quality of holes. This may be attributed to the better tool-work piece interaction in case of parabolic drill point geometry.