Effects of Fibers and Fillers on Mechanical Properties of Thermoplastic Composites

Thermoplastic copolyester elastomer (TCE) and Polyoxymethylene (POM) filled polytetrafluroethylene (PTFE) composite, reinforced with short glass fiber (SGF) and different shape microfillers such as short carbon fiber (SCF), silicon carbide (SiC) and alumina (Al2O3) were prepared by melt mixing method using twin screw extruder followed by injection moulding. Mechanical properties such as tensile, flexural and impact strengths were studied. The mechanical properties test results show that short glass fiber obviously improves the strength of TCE and POM filled PTFE composites and different shape ceramic fillers decreases the tensile and bending properties of TCE filled PTFE composite, but different shape microfillers exhibits a synergistic effect on tensile and bending properties of POM with PTFE simultaneously. Hybrid composites have shown lower tensile strength and strain with increase in fiber/filler content. POM composites exhibited better tensile (strength of 75.78 and modulus of 1769.1 MPa respectively) and flexural (strength of 116.2 and modulus of 5697 MPa respectively) properties. TCE composites showed moderate elongation at break and better impact strength as high as 80 J/m (with 20 wt % glass fiber content) compared to POM composites.