Fatigue life analysis and damage evaluation in glass fiber reinforced composite materials based on recycled polyethylene terephthalate

Abstract Viability of recycling polyethylene terephthalate (PET) can be enhanced by increasing its usage as a matrix material in manufacturing of composite materials. Structural applications of composite materials almost always involve fatigue loading and evaluation of fatigue behaviour is essential to explore the full potential of composite materials based on recycled PET. With an aim to increase the acceptability of recycled PET based resins, fatigue performance of glass fiber reinforced composite materials based on unsaturated polyester resin derived from recycled PET (rPET-UPR) has been evaluated in the present research. Glass fiber composites laminates of stacking sequence [0/(±45) 2 /0] T have been fabricated using vacuum infusion process. Fatigue tests were performed at the stress ratio of 0.1, where the stress level varied from 40%–80% of the ultimate tensile strength (UTS). The results of fatigue tests show that the fatigue lives of composites based on rPET-UPR were lower as compared to virgin polyester matrix composites. However, Statistical analysis of the fatigue life data using two parameter Weibull distribution, established that there is no deleterious effect on the scatter observed in fatigue lives of these composites, as compared to composites based on virgin polyester resin. Due to higher degradation of rPET-UPR matrix as well as weak interfacial properties, 13% higher self generated temperature was observed during fatigue loading in comparison to virgin resin based composite materials. A three phase stiffness degradation curve has been observed for these composite materials indicating stiffness loss in the range of 20%–35% till the time of failure, which correlates well with the experimental damage observations. A nonuniform and rapid damage growth was observed at high-stress levels, whereas a more uniform damage zone was observed at the low-stress levels.