Enhancement of mechanical properties in carbon fibre reinforced epoxy composite with and without graphite powder

Abstract

The use of composite material in engineering field is increasing day by day. Composite materials are largely replacing conventional metals nowadays due to their mechanical behaviours. Among all composite materials carbon fibre reinforced composites are of greater interest due to their high strength. There are several new developments made in carbon fibre composites like carbon nanotubes, carbon black etc.. in order to increase the composite strength. In this research, we are going to analyse the strength of the carbon fibre reinforced epoxy composite by using graphite powder as an additive material because of its negligible weight and hardness nature. Generally, composites were prepared by hand layup process. Specifically the tensile, the flexural and the impact properties are taken into the consideration. Three different specimens are prepared and tested for the above strengths. The first specimen is carbon fibre epoxy composite without any addition of graphite powder (filler material). The second one is carbon composite with 5% addition of graphite powder as a filler material and the last specimen is of carbon fibre composite with 10% addition of graphite powder. The above mentioned strengths are calculated for each specimen with the help of a Universal Testing Machine and Impact Tester. Specimen 3 shows greater strengths whereas Specimen 1 shows least strength among all the three specimens. The inclusion of graphite powder in the carbon composite shows increase in the mechanical properties of the resulting specimens.