Mechanical characterization of recycle FRP fibers by nano-indentation

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

As a potential material to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, recycled fibre-reinforced composite is in demand in construction and automotive industries where the pressure to recycle is high. Usually the composite materials are reinforced by the so-called recycled fiber-reinforced plastic (FRP) fibers which are mechanically processed to form micro- to nano-sized fibers or particles. Antex Western, which is a company located in Winnipeg, MB, develops various types of FRP-reinforced composites for interior and exterior building products. The company is looking for solutions to optimize small sized recycled FRP fibers, which is essential for the design of strong FRP-reinforced composites. Due to the small size of both fibers and particles (e.g. down to nanometer scale), it is challenging to characterize their mechanical properties by conventional facilities, which are designed to test samples with significantly larger size. Therefore, special expertise and facilities for micro-mechanical or even nano-mechanical characterization are needed, which are currently not available at Antex Western. In this project, the applicant proposes to characterize the micro- and nano-sized FRP samples available from Antex Western mainly by using nanoindentation and investigate the correlation between the strength of FRP fibers and their size, types of coating and processing time and technique (i.e., ball milling vs. hammer milling). As compared to other in-situ nanomechanical tester residing in an electron microscope, nanoindentation is significantly cheaper and easier to perform. Based on the findings of this project, recommendations will be given to Antex Western to improve the design and processing of the FRP fibers so that a combination of optimized strength and cost can be achieved, which will significantly strengthen the competitiveness of their products on FRP composites.