The Effect of Moisture Absorption and Gel-coating Process on the Mechanical Properties of the Basalt Fiber Reinforced Composite

Abstract

Generally, strength degradation is caused by the absorption of moisture in composites. For this reason, a fracture is generated in the composites and traces of glass fiber degrade human health and physical damage is generated. Therefore, in this research, we studied the mechanical properties change of composites by moistureabsorption. The composites were manufactured with and without the Gel-coating process and were immersed in a moisture absorption device at $80^{\circ}C$ for more than 100 days. The mechanical properties of the moistureabsorption composites and the composites which dry after moisture-absorption were compared. The mechanical properties degradation of basalt fiber composites according to the result of the measurement of moistureabsorption was smaller than that of glass fiber composites by about 20%. In addition, the coefficient of moisture absorption was lower for the case of Gel-coating processing than the composites without the Gel-coating process by about 2% and it was deduced that Gel-coating did not have a significant effect on the mechanical properties.