A Study on Thermal Characteristics of Epoxy Composites Reinforced with Short Bagasse Fibres

Abstract

The research reported in this thesis broadly consists of three parts: The first part provides the description of the materials used and the details of the experiments that are carried out during this research. It also presents the test results in regard to the micro-structural characteristics of the epoxy filled with bagasse fibers. The second part is about the development of a theoretical heat conduction model based on which a mathematical correlation has been proposed for estimation of effective thermal conductivity of polymer composites with uniformly distributed bagasse fibers. In this part, the correlation is validated through numerical analysis and experimentation. The last part has presented the experimental results related to the effective thermal conductivity of composites filled with bagasse fibers .The findings of this research suggest that by incorporation of bagsse fiber into epoxy resin, its effects, as expected are achieved in the form of modified thermal properties. Due to the presence of bagasse fiber, changes in their heat conduction behavior are seen. When bagasse fiberis added in epoxy matrix, the effective thermal conductivity of the composite is reduced as bagasse fiber is insulative in nature.. With light weight, lowered thermal expansion coefficient and improved insulation capability, the bagasse fiber reinforced epoxy composites can be used for applications such as insulation boards, food containers, thermos flasks, refrigeration industry, building materials, interiors of air crafts and automobiles etc