Mechanical Characterization of Unidirectional Banana–Glass Fiber-Reinforced Hybrid Composites

Abstract

Natural fibers are playing very important role in supporting the environmental balance and partially substitute to the structural applications. In this paper, hybrid composites are fabricated using unidirectional banana and unidirectional glass fibers into epoxy resin mixture. Percentage weight of unidirectional banana fibers considered in this study is varied from zero to 100% weight of fibers in the intervals of 20% weight of the total fibers. The objective of the present work is to evaluate and compare the mechanical properties of laminates such as tensile strength, flexural strength, and impact strength of different stacking sequences of unidirectional banana and glass fabrics. It is found that as the glass layer in the laminates increases, its mechanical properties enhance. When the natural fiber is hybridized with glass fiber, a moderate strength is observed in the composites. These hybrid composites can be used for medium load-bearing applications.