Effect of Agro-waste Microcoir Pith and Nano-alumina Reinforcement on Thermal Degradation and Dynamic Mechanical Behavior of Polyester Composites

This article presents the modest method to prepare multiphase composites using the coconut by-product known as coir pith and investigates the mechanical, thermal properties and surface morphology of the hybrid coir pith/nano alumina filler-reinforced polyester composites. The hybrid filler used in this study is naturally available microcoir pith and inorganic nano alumina. The coir pith is an organic waste which can be extracted from the surface of the coconut shell. The polyester composites with three different filler concentrations, namely, C1A1, C2A2 and C3A3 have been fabricated to study the properties variation. The objective of this work is, enhancing the thermal and mechanical properties of a polyester composite material by reinforcing the waste natural resources. The mechanical properties of the samples were assessed using tensile, flexural and dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA) testing, further the thermal stability of samples have been studied using the thermogravimetric analyzer (TGA). The 6.5% increase in storage modulus (E') of the C1A1 composite is found, this indicates the improvement of interfacial bonding between the matrix and fillers. Compared to neat polyester, C1A1 and C2A2 composites showed 25.1% and 18.6% higher tensile strength respectively. The fractured surface morphology was studied using Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscope (FESEM).