SUMMARY

The focus of this study is to investigate how to lightweight SMC composites for automotive applications without compromising their performance. This is accomplished by replacing, at least partially, the heaviest materials such as the glass fibers (GF) or calcium carbonate (CaCO3) with nanocellulose or nanoclays. In addition, the chopped glass fibers are replaced by glass fabric to better control the location and orientation of the glass fiber reinforcement and thus engineer the mechanical properties. Unsaturated polyester resin (UPR) is used as the resin, and a pilot scale sheet molding compound (SMC) is used to make the composites. The composites are made by stacking 2-5 layers of SMC layers in a mold, after appropriate conditioning of the SMC, and compression molding. The properties of interest of the composites are the density, moisture absorption, and mechanical including tensile, flexural, and impact strengths according to the corresponding ASTM.
To understand the effect of the nanocellulose or the kaolins, the glass fiber content of all composite formulations was targeted around 30 vol%. In addition, the viscosity was verified for all formulations to adhere to SMC industry standards. The quality of CNC and kaolin integration with the GF and resin respectively was investigated before and after SMC composite processing using a variety of material characterization techniques including spectroscopy, microscopy, and macroscopic testing.
The expected results will address design, processing, and testing challenges, as well as successes, and failures. The questions to be answered is whether or not CNC coated GF fabric and kaolin are significantly advantageous for SMC compared to chopped GF and calcium carbonate, respectively.