Influence of milled glass fillers on mode-II fracture toughness of polymer composites

This work focuses on investigating the effect of interface fibre orientation with milled glass fillers on mode-II fracture toughness of [0° 7 /θ°//θ°/0° 7 ] glass/epoxy laminates. The result reveals that the loading of 5 wt-% milled glass fillers in the epoxy matrix enhanced the interlaminar fracture toughness. Significantly, the filler-loaded samples improved the fracture toughness by 232% (3.32 times) in 0°/0° and 184% (2.84 times) in ±45° interface fibre orientation compared to the baseline samples. In addition, the interlaminar shear strength increased was increased by 82% in 0°/0° interface and 76% in ±45° interface fibre orientation. Finally, field emission scanning electron microscopic (FESEM) was used to study the fracture surfaces of different fibre orientations.