Investigation of Erosive Wear Behavior of Glass- Fiber/Iron-Mud Reinforced Epoxy Hybrid Composite: using Neural Computation and Particle Swarm Optimization Biswajyoti Pani, Polymersetty Chandrasekhar, Saranjit Singh School of Mechanical Engineering,KIIT (Deemed to be University), BBSR, Odisha ABSTRACT Iron-mining and ore processing are faced with the major challenge of generated overburden and topsoil aggregates as a major solid waste. Storage and reclamation are two severe problems with harmful environmental concerns. The present paper investigates the possible uses of iron mine waste for developing a new-class hybrid polymer composite and its tribological characteristics. The polymer composites are fabricated through a hand-layup process by reinforcement of woven glass fibers in epoxy polymer filled with different weight proportions of iron-mud. Erosion wear experiments were conducted on the fabricated composites according to Box-Behnken experimental design based on Response Surface Methodology approach under controlled laboratory conditions using an air-jet type erosion tester. Artificial Neural Network predicted values exhibited a close relationship with the experimental erosion values. Filler addition resulted in an improvement in the erosion resistance. A metaheuristic approach like particle swarm optimization revealed the minimum erosion value at the optimal parametric combination. Finally, the morphology of eroded surfaces was critically examined by scanning electron microscopy, and the possible erosion mechanisms were presented. KEYWORDS Mines waste; polymer composites; erosive wear; morphology; ANN; PSO. INTRODUCTION Many technological and industrial engineering applications, for example, load-bearing parts of buildings, tank/vessels, bridges, automobiles applications and so on, considered fiber-reinforced polymer composites (FRPCs) as a feasible option. These FRPCs are widely used as a superior tribo-engineering material given their many advantages like wear resistance and excellent stiffness to weight ratio and strength to weight ratio as compared to monolithic metal alloys. Despite these advantages, its high cost and unstable properties have reduced its use. Fillers that are available in abundance at a low cost are a viable, yet economical, option. The inclusion of fillers has a two-fold purpose: firstly, to add superior mechanical and tribological properties to the component, and secondly, to make the component economical. The investigation of the influence of inclusion of fillers (micrometer- sized particulates) needs necessarily a high filler content of generally 20% to be incorporated into polymer composites. Significant properties, like density, process-ability, aging and appearance may face antagonistic effect due to inclusion of this high filler content[1, 2]. Therefore, the appropriate selection of fillers, fibers, matrix and processing techniques lends itself to the manufacturing of customized materials to meet the needs of specific engineering requirements. Ceramic-filled polymer composites, though extensively researched in the last two decades, are expensive because of the high cost of conventional ceramic fillers. Thus, International Journal of Management, Technology And Engineering Volume 8, Issue X, OCTOBER/2018 ISSN NO : 2249-7455 Page No:2406