Investigation of usability of waste textile fabrics in composites Mustafa Özen PhD Associate Professor, Mechanical Engineering Department, Harran University, Şanliurfa, Turkey Gökhan Demircan MSc Research Assistant, Mechanical Engineering Department, Harran University, Şanliurfa, Turkey (corresponding author: gdemircan@harran.edu.tr) (Orcid:0000-0002-9579-6878) Murat Kisa PhD Professor, Mechanical Engineering Department, Harran University, Şanliurfa, Turkey Zeki İlik MSc Mechanical Engineer, Institute of Natural and Applied Sciences, Harran University, Şanliurfa, Turkey Nowadays, the use of environmentally friendly ecological materials has become very important with increasing environmental awareness and raw material costs. The use of reinforcements such as cotton, jute, bamboo and sisal in natural-fiber-reinforced composite materials has become very popular in terms of low cost and raw material richness. In addition, there is also a growing interest in natural-fiber-reinforced composites due to their mechanical properties, significant operation advantages and chemical resistance, as well as environmental reasons. In recent years, it has become necessary to investigate how other fiber types affect the engineering properties of composites. How these fibers change the mechanical and physical properties of the composite is a matter to be investigated, and it is important to provide scientific data in the areas where ecological-fiber-reinforced composites can be used. In this study, in order to recycle waste fabrics (modal, micromodal, Tencel, viscose, hemp) collected from textile factories, economic composites were produced by using the vacuum-assisted resin transfer molding method and their mechanical properties were examined. As a result, the best tensile strength was observed for modal composites; the best compression strength, for viscose composites; and the best flexural strength, for micromodal composites. 1. Introduction Textile products, which have indispensable uses, such as in nutrition, shelter and health, covering areas as important as clothing, accessory, defense, industry and automotives, have an important place in people’ s everyday lives. 1 Today’ s textile products, which are usually obtained from plant products (such as cotton and linen), are being used in a wide range of applications, from medical applications to construction materials, from space technologies to sports goods and from furniture to automotives. 2 The basis of engineering applications is to reduce the cost of raw materials during manufacturing and to use recyclable materials when the life of the material is over. Most of these problems can be solved by using composite materials in developing technology. 3 Synthetic fabric reinforcements, such as glass, Kevlar and carbon (C) are preferred in today’ s composite production. However, the decomposability in nature of these reinforcements is very low. In this context, the use of reinforcements such as cotton, jute, bamboo and sisal in natural- fiber-reinforced composite materials has become very popular in terms of low cost and raw material richness. 4 Garkhail et al. 5 formed composites with linen fibers and polypropylene (PP). These composites were subjected to hardness, bending, tension and Charpy impact tests. The values obtained as a result of the tests were examined, and it was observed that natural-fiber-reinforced composites were attractive for low-cost engineering applications and the natural fibers could compete with glass fibers. Singleton et al. 6 studied the recycling of natural-fiber-reinforced polymers. Thermoplastics were used as the matrix material in their work, and thus, recycling was easily achieved. Sadıkoglu et al. 7 carried out studies on the use of waste polyester textiles in composite materials. They produced polyester-based thermoset composites using waste fabrics and woven glass fibers. The mechanical properties (tensile, flexural and impact resistance) of the composites were investigated in accordance with ASTM standards. Barone et al. 8 produced composites by combining keratinous feather fibers from chicken feathers with high-density polyethylene resin. It was observed that the tensile properties of the composites produced weakened as hardness increased. Arnold et al. 9 worked on the recovery of used waste fabrics. In their work, polymer matrix composite plates were produced using waste fabrics as reinforcing material. The pressure-molding method was used in the production of composite materials. Impact and tensile tests were carried out on the specimens according to the standards, and the test results were compared. de Carvalho et al. 10 investigated the tensile strength of hybrid jute/cotton-reinforced composites in their work. For this purpose, different orientation angles of [0], [0/90], [0/90/0], [90/0/90] and [0/90/0/90] and different jute weight ratios were used. It was observed that changing the weight ratio of the jute in [0]-oriented unidirectional composites did not lead to a significant change in the tensile strength of the material, but in all other configurations, the tensile strength decreased. Khanam et al. 11 produced hybrid 1 Cite this article Özen M, Demircan G, Kisa M and İlik Z Investigation of usability of waste textile fabrics in composites. Emerging Materials Research, https://doi.org/10.1680/jemmr.18.00106 ICCESEN Conference Paper 1800106 Received 25/09/2018; Accepted 15/11/2019 ICE Publishing: All rights reserved Keywords: composites/mechanical properties/natural materials Emerging Materials Research Emerging Materials Research 2020.9:1-6.