Experimental investigation on mechanical and wear properties of nanoclay-epoxy composites

The work targets to fabricate and characterize "nanoclay-epoxy composites" (NECs) by varying weight percentages (wt.%) of nanoclay. Mechanical stirrer and sonicator are used to mix nanoclay into epoxy resin. The mixture is molded to prepare specimens in accordance with ASTM standards. The addition of nanoclay increased the mechanical properties of fabricated composites. Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) images revealed the causes of specimen failure. Four factors viz., nanoclay wt.%, speed, load, and time at three levels are considered a wear test on a pin-on-disc machine. The design of experiments (Taguchi design) is applied for the experimentation, and analysis of variance is established through Minitab 19 software. Results revealed that the nanoclay addition improved the resistance to wear of epoxy. (c) 2020 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).