Environmental Degradation of Glass Fibre Reinforced Polymer Composites

Abstract

Carbon fibre-reinforced polymer (CFRP) and Glass fibre-reinforced polymer (GFRP) have been used as an alternative to steel in concrete due to high strength-to-weight ratio, high stiffness-to-weight ratio, and corrosion and fatigue resistance. GFRP‟s have been found attractive in the Asian region due to their cost competitiveness in comparison to CFRP. Wide-spread use of fibre-reinforced polymers (FRP) in construction is hampered in this part of world due to lack of long-term durability and performance data, especially in a tropical environment. The main environmental factors for the deterioration of GFRP are temperature, sunshine, water/moisture, alkalinity and load. Most of the early durability tests were carried out with reference to application of FRP (Fibre Reinforced Polymer) in aerospace. Thus considerable data is available with only one or a combination of some of these parameters. Hence effort is required to fully comprehend the GFRP response under natural and accelerated moisture and temperature conditions. For the achieving the objective an experimental setup was prepared. The aim of the experiment was to study the combined effect of chosen parameters moisture, alkali and temperature & also to study the rate & magnitude of damage of GFRP composites. This will help in studying the response of the composite to the given hygrothermal load. The changes occurring in the physical composition of the composite material were also studied.