Static, dynamic mechanical, and thermal analysis of coir/epoxy composites: Effect of hollow glass microspheres reinforcement

Nowadays, various types of biocomposites are being developed using different types of natural fibers and polymers to fulfill the requirement for sustainable products. Recently, the addition of fillers in biocomposites has been a useful approach to improve their performance and overwhelm their limitations. The hollow glass microspheres (HGMs) were uniformly distributed into epoxy using a magnetic stirrer and subsequently, a hand lay-up technique was employed to produce the HGMs/coir/epoxy composites under a static loading condition. In the current study, the effect of varying weight percentages (i.e., 1, 3, and 5) of HGMs on the mechanical, dynamic mechanical, and thermal properties of coir/epoxy composites has been studied. Further, morphological analysis of fractured surfaces of samples was also performed. The results suggested that the addition of HGMs caused a significant improvement in the tensile and impact properties of the composites but could not extensively improve the flexural strength, thermal stability, storage modulus, and loss modulus. There was a significant improvement of 80.5% in tensile strength and 24.7% in impact strength of composites after the addition of 1 wt%. HGMs. Further, tensile and flexural moduli were found to be gradually improved with increased HGMs weight percentages in the composites.