Mechanical Behaviour of Aluminium Dispersed Unsaturated Polyester/Jute Composites for Structural Applications

The fibrous filler Jute along with Al particle reinforced unsaturated polyester composites having different filler (both Jute and Al were in equal wt%) were fabricated by compression molding technique. The variation of loading was taken as 2, 5, 10 and 15 wt% in the fabricated composites. In present investigation, it was observed that with fillers (Jute and Al) incorporation the microhardness increases and become optimum at 10 wt% of fillers content followed by slight deterioration at 15 wt%. Structural investigation through scanning electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction confirm the dispersion of the fillers within the composites. An improvement of crystallinity % of the matrix with filler addition was observed as predicted from X-ray diffraction technique. The results of tensile testing shows that the strength and modulus increase monotonically up to 10 wt% of filler addition followed by slight decreases at 15 wt% of the same. The scratch result shows the optimization of strength and toughness of the composites with filler content of 10 wt%.