Analysis of Mechanical Properties of Injection Molded Short Glass Fibre (SGF)/Calcite/ABS Composites

Acrylonitrile-butadiene-Styrene (ABS), with and without calcium carbonate (calcite) particles,was used as the matrix for reinforcement with as-received short-glass fibres (were originallytreated by the manufacturer) and sized short-glass fibres with two amino-silane coupling agents.The calcite particle content is 0, 11.7 and 23.5 vol. pct for the matrices. The glass fiber contentis 0, 10 and 15 vol. pct. The matrix materials and corresponding composites were compoundedusing a twin screw extruder and dumbbell-shaped tensile bars were prepared with an injectionmolding process. The tensile and flexural properties as well as the unnotched and notchedCharpy impact energies of short glass fibre/calcite/ABS composites were studied in this paper.The effects of fibres, fibre surface treatments and particles on these mechanical properties ofthe composites were discussed in detail. An importarit information was obtained, which is thatthe tensile and flexural strengths of hybrid SGF/calcite/ABS composites are the same as thoseof corresponding fibre composites when the ratio of the interfacial adhesion strength betweenparticles and matrix to that between fibres and matrix is higher than certain value. otherwise theformer are lower than the latter.

Influence of tool pin profile and rotational speed on the formation of friction stir welding zone in AZ31 magnesium alloy

In this investigation,the effect of friction stir welding(FSW)parameters such as tool pin profiles,rotational speed and welding speed on the mechanical properties of tensile strength,hardness and impact energy of magnesium alloy AZ31 was studied.The experiments were carried out as per Taguchi parametric design concepts and an L9 orthogonal array was used to study the influence of various combinations of process parameters.Statistical optimization technique,ANOVA,was used to determine the optimum levels and to find the significance of each process parameter.The results indicate that rotational speed(RS)and transverse speed(TS)are the most significant factors,followed by tool pin profile(PF),in deciding the mechanical properties of friction stir welded magnesium alloy.In addition,mathematical models were developed to establish relationship between different process variables and mechanical properties.

An Average Failure Index Method for the Tensile Strength Prediction of Composite Adhesive-bonded π Joints

An average failure index method based on accurate FEA was proposed for the tensile strength prediction of composite out-of-plane adhesive-bonded π joints. Based on the simple and independent maximum stress failure criterion, the failure index was introduced to characterize the degree of stress components close to their corresponding material strength. With a brief load transfer analysis, the weak fillers were prominent and further detailed discussion was performed. The maximum value among the average failure indices which were related with different stress components was filtrated to represent the failure strength of the critical surface, which is either the two curved upside surfaces or the bottom plane of the fillers for composite π joints. The tensile strength of three kinds of π joints with different material systems, configurations and lay-ups was predicted by the proposed method and corresponding experiments were conducted. Good agreements between the numerical and experimental results give evidence of the effectiveness of the proposed method. In contrast to the existed time-consuming strength prediction methods, the proposed method provides a capability of quickly assessing the failure of complex out-of-plane joints and is easy and convenient to be widely utilized in engineering.

Research on Piezoelectric Driving Microminiature Three-Legged Crawling Robot

Micro-robots have the characteristics of small size,light weight and flexible movement.To design a micro three-legged crawling robot with multiple motion directions,a novel driving scheme based on the inverse piezoelectric effect of piezoelectric ceramics was proposed.The three legs of the robot were equipped with piezoelectric bimorphs as drivers,respectively.The motion principles were analyzed and the overall force analysis was carried out with the theoretical mechanics method.The natural frequency,mode shape and amplitude were analyzed with simulation software COMSOL Multiphysics,the optimal size was determined through parametric analysis,and then the micro three-legged crawling robot was manufactured.The effects of different driving voltages,different driving frequencies,different motion bases and different loads on the motion speed of the robot were tested.It is shown that the maximum speed of single-leg driving was 35.41 cm/s,the switching ability between different motion directions was measured,and the movements in six different directions were achieved.It is demonstrated the feasibility of multi-directional motion of the structure.The research may provide a reference for the design and development of miniature piezoelectric three-legged crawling robots.

Promising commercial reinforcement to the nanodiamond/epoxy composite by grafting ammonium ions

A simple, economic, efficient and eco-friendly nanodiamond （ND） modifying method to reinforce the ND]epoxy composite for the industrialization of the high-performance ND/epoxy composite is always desired. In the present work, the ND was successfully modified only using aqueous ammonia through an easy-to-operate method by replacing the hydrogen atoms in the carboxyl group with ammonium ions. Ammonia, which is the only pollutant in the process, could be recycled. The modified ND/epoxy composite showed an overwhelming advantage over the neat epoxy or the ND/epoxy composite in storage modulus in their glassy state without any degradation of tensile strength, hardness and fracture toughness.