Solid Particle Erosion Behavior of Needlepunched Nonwoven Reinforced Composites

The paper describes a series of preliminary experiments that are conducted to investigate the mechanical properties and erosive wear behavior of needlepunched nonwoven polypropylene (PP) fibre reinforced epoxy based composites. The tests are conducted on an air jet erosion test rig and design of an experimental approach which utilizes Taguchi’s orthogonal arrays is adopted for an analysis of the results. The findings of the experiments indicate that fiber content in needlepunched nonwovens, impingement angle and impact velocity are significant factors in descending importance with regard to their influence on the wear rate. It is confirmed from a steady state erosion study that PP fiber reinforced epoxy nonwoven composites mostly exhibit a semi-ductile erosion response. An optimal parameter combination has been determined for minimization of erosive wear rate. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) and S/N (signal-to-noise) ratios have been performed on the measured data. The results of Taguchi’s experimental design are proposed as empirical equations for the estimation of the erosion wear rate of these composites. It is demonstrated that the predicted results obtained using the empirical model are consistent with experimental observations.