Exploration of Dry Sliding Wear Behaviour of Sisal Fiber Reinforced Cashew Nut Shell Liquid and Epoxy Polymer Matrix Composite as an Alternative Friction Material in Automobiles 2019-28-0173

The brake pad is one of the foremost imperative parts of the vehicle. Due to the environmental requirement, natural materials were the alternate source for products manufacturing. The product composite made by using hot press techniques with mixing ingredients such as natural fiber (treated sisal), cashew nut filler, graphite and alumina with resin (cashew nut shell liquid - CNSL and epoxy). Two formulas and four samples of each set were composed by varying the resin type of CNSL and epoxy and prepared the test samples with attaining better hardness. The main intern of this proposed effort is to appraise the wear in dry sliding and performance of friction of the prepared composites. The composites are taken for tribo test by varying the load of 10,20,30,40 N and sliding distance of 1000, 2000 m respectively. Experiments were performed at stated process parametric conditions to record the responses. The result shows that the CNSL resin composites specific wear resistance and frictional coefficients are found better than epoxy resin composites. The addition of filler element cashew nut shell particular shows a better wear resistant and friction coefficient. On the other hand, low wear resistance and low friction coefficient were appraised at a high load of 40 N and sliding distance of 2000 m tribo parametric conditions. Further scanning electron microscopic analysis was carried out to observe wear mechanics with the formation of very fine debris on the worn surface and counter face of the composite.