THE EFFECT OF SLS TREATMENT ON TENSILE PROPERTY OF COCONUT FIBER REINFORCED EPOXY COMPOSITES

A study on the effect of fiber length and fiber surface modification on tensile property of alkaline treated coir fiber reinforced epoxy composites is presented in this paper. The fiber surface treatment was carried out using Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS) solution at five different concentrations, 2%, 4%, 6%, 8% and 10% respectively. Each group of the coir fiber was treated for 10 days. For each group the coir fibers experiments were conducted for different fiber lengths namely 10, 20, and 30mm. The SLS treated coir fiber was used as a reinforcement and epoxy was used as a matrix to fabricate the composites. The tensile strength of different samples of composites was measured. Increased SLS concentration in fiber treatment was found to increase the tensile strength up to 4% and further increase in SLS concentration reduced the tensile strength, also, experimental results showed that an increase in fiber length increased tensile strength. The maximum tensile strength of the composite was found to be uniformly occurring for 4% SLS with 30mm fiber length composite samples. Based on the nonlinear regression analysis the tensile strength equation was proposed for coir fiber reinforced epoxy composites.