Preparation and Characterization of Waste Silk Fiber Reinforced Polymer Composites

Polymeric materials reinforced with synthetic fiber such as glass, carbon and aramid provide advantages of high stiffness and strength to weight ratio and their use is very well justified in varieties of applications. Despite these advantages, the wide spread use of synthetic fiber- reinforced polymer composite is declining because of their higher cost and adverse environmental impact. On the other hand the use of natural fiber to develop environment friendly green materials are attracting researches worldwide due to their advantages like biodegradability, high weight, low-cost and high specific strength compared to synthetic fiber. In this category, silk is also a natural fiber. It is mainly branded as a status symbol of wealth and luxury. Just like any other conventional raw materials in silk manufacturing also wastes are generated during manufacturing. These wastes to some extent are used for manufacturing less delicate products such as sportswear, draperies and upholstery. In order to find value added application of this waste, the present work deals with preparation and characterization of epoxy composite with addition of waste silk fibers. In this work, the waste silk was collected from the silk industries located in Raigarh, (district) Chattishgarh, India. This waste material in local language is called as “Ghincha”. The composites with different weight fraction of silk fiber (2, 4, 6 and 8 wt %) were prepared with epoxy as matrix material by hand lay-up technique. Experiments were conducted under laboratory condition to assess the effect of different environment such as subzero, steam, saline water and natural conditions for various time lengths. The change in weight, volume and dimensions are studied for various treatments. Shear strength of the composites was evaluated by three point bend test as per ASTM standard. The increase the potential use of waste silk fiber, in the present study the erosion wear behavior of silk fiber and hybrid laminate composites with Jute and synthetic fiber glass have also been carried out. The composites degradation time varies with different environmental treatments. The erosion response of silk fiber composites shows semi ductile behavior. However the hybridization improves the erosion response of silk fiber from semi ductile to ductile nature. Hence the above results of environmental effect and erosive response of silk fiber clearly show the potential application for making partition board, false ceiling, doors and window panels