Tensile mechanical performance of natural/natural fiber reinforced hybrid bio-composite materials – A statistical approach

The main objective and the originality of this work are to create a hybrid natural/natural fiber bio-composite by Response Surface Methodology RMS technique based on statistical analysis of variance ANOVA by using the properties of the individual fiber bio-composites. Hybrid bio-composites are manufactured by combining two or more dissimilar kinds of fiber in a single continuous phase. In the first section, Response Surface Methodology using a Box-Behnken experimental design and the Analysis of Variance are applied to investigate the effects of the type of fibers, the type of chemical treatment, the volume fraction of fiber and the treatment time on the tensile properties namely, ultimate tensile strength and Young’s modulus in the tensile quasi-static loading when used two resins namely, epoxy and polyester. In the studied range, statistical analysis of the results showed that selected variables had a significant effect on the mechanical properties, except the treatment time that has a very weak significance effect on the mechanical properties. Then, to maximize the mechanical properties, the optimal conditions coded by RSM were found: the type of fibers of [−0.28 and −0.33], the chemical treatment of −1, the volume fraction of fiber of 1 and the treatment duration of [−0.97 and −1] for epoxy resin matrix. Similarly, when used the polyester resin matrix; the type of fibers of −0.26, the chemical treatment of −1, the volume fraction of 0.99 and the sinking time of [−0.94 and −0.93]. The obtained optimum parameters were confirmed experimentally in the second section.