Tensile Properties of Cenosphere/HDPE Syntactic Foams Manufactured Using an Industrial Scale Injection Molding Technque

Abstract

Composite materials having hollow fillers in a matrix material are known as syntactic foams. Such lightweight composites are used in a variety of applications ranging from sports, transportation, aviation and marine structures due to high dimensional stability, compressive strength and low moisture absorption. The present work is focused on using an industrial scale injection molding technique for fabricating syntactic foams and characterizing the fabricated syntactic foams for tensile properties. Use of such techniques can help in developing foams with high quality for bulk applications. Hollow fly ash cenospheres are used as the filler particles due to their low cost. Use of these industrial waste particles in beneficial applications can also help in their disposal. The present work is aimed at characterizing syntactic foams for tensile properties and investigating the effect of filler content. The syntactic foam density can be changed by changing cenospheres content. Cenospheres in 20 and 60 wt.% are used in syntactic foams in the present work. ASTM D 638-10 standard for the tensile properties of unreinforced and reinforced plastics is followed for the tensile testing.