Protective rigid fiber-reinforced polyurethane foam composite boards: Sound absorption, drop-weight impact and mechanical properties

Polyurethane foam has been develocped for years. In the past, the most study is focused on one function of Polyurethane foam including noise absorption, thermal protection, and mechanical impact as well as cushioning properties, and thus interdisciplinary functions of these foam boards become an innovation research. Therefore, the objective of study is to develop the multifunctional protective composite boards which are suitable for diversified environments. In this study, the carbon fibers (CF) and glass fibers (GF) are used as reinforcements for PU composite boards which are denoted as CFR-PU and GFR-PU respectively. The composite boards are made with different thickness and different contents of reinforcing fibers. The drop-weight impact test adopts a circular drop weight that falls from a certain height in order to observe the deformation mechanism of the boards. Different fracture modes that are caused by the bursting, compression, drop-weight impact, and puncture resistance tests are then examined. The test results indicate that the CFR-PU and GFR-PU fiberreinforced composite boards have a satisfactory impact load of 90 % and a favorable absorption coefficient at a certain frequency, and also have improved mechanical properties.