Flexural Response of Cross-Ply Flax Fiber–Reinforced Polymer Skinned Foam Cylinders
Publication: Journal of Composites for Construction
Volume 23, Issue 6
Abstract
The flexural response of 12 2-m-long and 152-mm-diameter fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) skinned members with foam cores was investigated. Nine cylinders with various flax-FRP (FFRP) laminate arrangements and foam core densities were fabricated and tested in flexure; these were compared with three glass-FRP (GFRP) skinned specimens. Varying the foam density from 32 to was found to be insignificant in FFRP skinned beams because their failure was governed by fiber tensile rupture. However, increasing the foam density increased the capacity of the GFRP skinned members that failed in compression. The most effective ways to increase strength-to-weight and stiffness-to-weight ratios of FFRP skinned cylinders are to increase the number of longitudinal fiber layers and decrease the foam core density. A FFRP cylinder with five longitudinal and three transverse layers was able to develop over 80% the strength-to-weight and stiffness-to-weight ratios as a reference GFRP cylinder, substantially higher than the 30%–50% values seen in coupon tests. Although the FFRP cylinder performed fairly well, further work on the member axial, impact, and durability resistance is recommended.
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Data Availability Statement
Experimental testing data generated and used during the study are available from the corresponding author by request.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Composites for Construction
Volume 23 • Issue 6 • December 2019
Copyright
©2019 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Oct 30, 2018
Accepted: Apr 19, 2019
Published online: Sep 28, 2019
Published in print: Dec 1, 2019
Discussion open until: Feb 28, 2020
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