Evaluation of mechanical properties of polytherimide reinforced carbon/glass/aramid hybrid composites

Composites are quite competent in mechanical strength than metals. Due its high strength to weight ratio, light weight, take over the need of metal which were exhaustively used in the manufacturing of the structure of automobile and aircraft. In this research, the effect of mechanical properties, i.e. tensile and flexural strength on hybrid composites fabricated using woven carbon fabric, glass fabric and aramid fabric (Kelvar 29) and has been studied. Composites were fabricated using a compression molding technique. Tensile strength varies from 148 MPa to 501 MPa, flexural strength varies from 11 MPa to 19 MPa and hardness of the sample varies from 54D to 96 D. The tensile test and flexural test is carried based on ASTM D638 and ASTM D790 specification respectively. Scanning electron microscopic (SEM) images were used to analyze the surface morphology of the developed composites. The study concluded that the presence of carbon fiber in the composites results in better mechanical properties of the composite material. (C) 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.