Dynamic Mechanical Analysis of Arenga Pinnata Fibre Reinforced Epoxy Composites: Effects of Fibre Aging

One of the major drawbacks for natural fibres reinforced in polymer composites deal with outside applications is the aging phenomena. This paper presents the effect of aging in Arenga Pinnata fibre reinforced epoxy composites. The samples composed of 30% long random fibre by weight were produced by using a hand lay-up process. The composites were than undergone accelerated aging process with aged conditions of 30 days, 67 days and 135 days respectively in according to ASTM F1980 prior series of Dynamic Mechanical Analysis (DMA) evaluation. Un-aged (0 day) specimens were used as a control environment. Contrary to popular believe, it is found that the aging conditions offer better dynamic mechanical properties, evidently from DMA result of Storage Modulus, Loss Modulus and Tan Delta.