Investigation of mechanical properties and free vibration behavior of graphene/basalt nano filler banana/sisal hybrid composite

This research work addresses the influence of graphene and basalt filler on mechanical properties and free vibration behavior of banana/sisal hybrid composite. Banana/sisal hybrid composites were prepared with three weight percentage (wt.%), 6 wt.% of graphene, and basalt filler by a compression molding process. The improvement in tensile strength of 24.8% and 30% was noticed for the basalt (6 wt.%) and graphene (6 wt.%) filler addition, respectively. Comparing with basalt addition, graphene addition provides an 1.5 times improvement in flexural strength. The tensile fractography was also carried out and studied the interfacial bonding of the composite. From the morphology, it was observed that there was a good interfacial adhesion between the fiber and the matrix which enhance the mechanical property of the hybrid composite. The free vibrational behavior of the hybrid composite has also been analyzed. The modal analysis shows the enhanced natural frequencies and modal damping for the addition of 6 wt.% of graphene filler in the hybrid composite.