Characterization of mechanical and dynamic properties of natural fiber reinforced laminated composite multiple-core sandwich plates

The present article deals with the study of material, mechanical and dynamic characteristics of natural fiber reinforced composite sandwich plates with multiple-core layers. The multiple-core sandwich structure contains the jute fibers reinforced polymer composites as face layers and the natural rubber and cork as core layer. The material characterization such as X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), Thermogravimetric Analysis (TGA), and Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) was carried out to investigate the crystallinity, thermal stability, and morphology of untreated and treated jute fiber materials. The tensile and flexural properties of natural composite material was examined using ASTM D3039 and ASTM D7264 standards. The governing equations for the natural fibers reinforced composite sandwich plates are developed using a finite element method. The performance of the developed model is validated by comparing the results available in the published literature. The numerical results indicate that the multiple-core natural composite sandwich plate greatly influences the structural stiffness compared with a single-core natural composite sandwich plate. Furthermore, the influence of core layer configuration, end condition, aspect ratio and ply sequence on the dynamic properties of the multiple-core natural composite sandwich plate are presented.