Fabrication of Fibre Metal Laminate with Flax and Sugar Palm Fibre based Epoxy Composite and Evaluation of their Fatigue Properties

Fibre metal laminate (FML) with the carbon, flax and sugar palm fibres were prepared by hand layup and hot press technique. Their tensile and fatigue properties were studied. Results indicate that both the tensile properties and fatigue behaviour was dependent on the natural fibre type and their stacking sequence in the laminate. Flax based FML showed promising results with superior tensile properties and fatigue life. It also displayed fibre bridging mechanism, a phenomenon responsible for the higher fatigue life. Introducing flax in combination with sugar palm fibre resulted in slightly higher fatigue life than the sugar palm fibre based FML. FML with the sugar palm fibres showed the least fatigue life below 1000 cycles and did not exhibit fibre bridging effect. This behaviour indicates that sugar palm fibre may not be a suitable fibre for applications requiring fatigue resistance.