Understanding the applicability of natural fibre composites in hybrid folded structures

Center for Advanced Composite Materials, Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Auckland, Auckland, 1010, New Zealand

Adv. Mater. Lett., 2018, 9 (9), pp 619-623

DOI: 10.5185/amlett.2018.2073

Publication Date (Web): Jun 14, 2018

Copyright © IAAM-VBRI Press

E-mail: acha553@aucklanduni.ac.nz

Abstract

One of the important by-products of wood is veneer sheets which can be pressed together to form plywood. Also known as radiata pine veneer, plywood has been increasingly used in different engineering applications and its unique thin structure, with significant mechanical properties, has increased its demand for hybrid deformed structures. The main scope of the present work is to understand the formability characteristics of the plywood with multiple bend axis on the same plane. The properties of wood nullify the normal bending process due to the significant amount of spring-back for the inherent properties of the constituent natural fibres bounded by a predominant lignin component. The process of in-situ curing and post-forming curing were used to achieve the desired folds. Experiment was performed on various plywood samples, with 4-point bending rig, to understand the variation in stress and strain due to variable distances between the bends and the maximum post-curing time. Finally, the overall spring-back analytically varied by 1.96%. 

Keywords

4-Point bending, forming of 3-ply laminates, spring-back, spring-forward, structural significance of plywood.