Mechanical behavior of sisal and banana fiber reinforced hybrid epoxy composites

Abstract Nowadays, new eco-friendly and recyclable natural fibers have gained attention over the commercially used synthetic fibers. The biodegradable nature of the natural fibers attracts scientists. It has a significant advantage over synthetic fiber materials, which predominantly are glass, carbon, and plastic fibers. Practice of implementing natural fiber in composite materials for commercial applications became the trend nowadays. In this study, natural fibers obtained from sisal and banana plants made into a composite by sandwich layering technique. This composite is analyzed to determine the mechanical properties of the sisal/banana/banana/sisal hybrid composite. The results are compared with the individual mechanical properties of sisal/epoxy and banana/epoxy composites to determine the composite, which has the highest mechanical strength. This work revealed that the sisal/epoxy composite had the highest tensile, flexural, and impact strength of 24.5 MPa, 80.45 MPa, and 1.76 J, respectively, than all other composite combinations. The interfacial bonding and matrix dispersion of the composite samples observed through a Scanning Electron Microscope.