ADVANCES IN COMPOSITE MATERIALS - ANALYSIS OF NATURAL AND MAN-MADE MATERIALS Edited by Pavla Těšinová Advances in Composite Materials - Analysis of Natural and Man-Made Materials Edited by Pavla Těšinová Published by InTech Janeza Trdine 9, 51000 Rijeka, Croatia Copyright © 2011 InTech All chapters are Open Access articles distributed under the Creative Commons Non Commercial Share Alike Attribution 3.0 license, which permits to copy, distribute, transmit, and adapt the work in any medium, so long as the original work is properly cited. After this work has been published by InTech, authors have the right to republish it, in whole or part, in any publication of which they are the author, and to make other personal use of the work. Any republication, referencing or personal use of the work must explicitly identify the original source. Statements and opinions expressed in the chapters are these of the individual contributors and not necessarily those of the editors or publisher. No responsibility is accepted for the accuracy of information contained in the published articles. The publisher assumes no responsibility for any damage or injury to persons or property arising out of the use of any materials, instructions, methods or ideas contained in the book. Publishing Process Manager Romina Krebel Technical Editor Teodora Smiljanic Cover Designer Jan Hyrat Image Copyright Eugene Sergeev, 2010. Used under license from Shutterstock.com First published July, 2011 Printed in Croatia A free online edition of this book is available at www.intechopen.com Additional hard copies can be obtained from [email protected] Advances in Composite Materials - Analysis of Natural and Man-Made Materials, Edited by Pavla Těšinová p. cm. ISBN 978-953-307-449-8 Contents Preface IX Part 1 Material Properties 1 Chapter 1 Composites Containing Waste Materials 3 Milena Koleva, Anka Zheglova, Venceslav Vassilev and Emilija Fidancevska Chapter 2 Porous Particle-Polymer Composites 29 Parvez Alam Chapter 3 Polymer Composites for Bone Reconstruction 55 Mervi Puska, Allan J. Aho and Pekka Vallittu Chapter 4 New Generation of Geopolymer Composite for Fire-Resistance 73 Tran Doan Hung, Petr Louda, Dora Kroisová, Oleg Bortnovsky and Nguyen Thang Xiem Chapter 5 POLICRYPS Composite Materials: Features and Applications 93 R. Caputo, L. De Sio, A. Veltri, A. V. Sukhov, N. V. Tabiryan and C. P.Umeton Part 2 Natural Sources 119 Chapter 6 Composite Materials from Natural Resources: Recent Trends and Future Potentials 121 Mohini Saxena, Asokan Pappu, Anusha Sharma, Ruhi Haque and Sonal Wankhede Chapter 7 Natural Fiber Polymer Composites Technology Applied to the Recovery and Protection of Tropical Forests Allied to the Recycling of Industrial and Urban Residues 163 Alessandra de Almeida Lucas, José Donato Ambrósio, Baltus Cornelius Bonse and Sílvia Helena Prado Bettini VI Contents Chapter 8 Bone: A Composite Natural Material 195 Maria Fátima Vaz, Helena Canhão and João Eurico Fonseca Chapter 9 Wood-Polymer Composites 229 Yongfeng Li Chapter 10 Engineered Membranes and Transporters for Useful Devices 285 John Cuppoletti and Danuta H. Malinowska Part 3 Manufacturing 295 Chapter 11 Mechanical Improvement of Ramie Woven Reinforced-Starch Based Biocomposite Using Biosizing Method 297 Eko Marsyahyo, Siswi Astuti and Iftitah Ruwana Chapter 12 Thermoplastic Matrix Composites from Towpregs 307 João Silva, João Nunes, C. A. Bernardo and António Marques Chapter 13 Wood Plastic Composites 325 El-Haggar, Salah M. and Kamel, Mokhtar A. Chapter 14 Curing Monitoring of Composite Material Using Embedded Fiber Bragg Grating Sensors 345 Chia-Chin Chiang Part 4 Testing 361 Chapter 15 The Synergy of Electrochemistry and Concrete Material Science in Evaluating Corrosion Resistance of Wastes-Containing Reinforced Cement-Based Systems 363 D. A. Koleva and K. van Breugel Chapter 16 Intralaminar Fracture Toughness Characterization of Composite Laminates 389 Maurício V. Donadon and Sérgio Frascino Muller de Almeida Chapter 17 Ultrasonic Pulse Velocity Evaluation of Cementitious Materials 411 T. H. Panzera, A. L. Christoforo, F. P. Cota, P. H. R. Borges and C. R. Bowen Chapter 18 Macro-Micro Mechanical Behavior of a Highly-Particle-Filled Composite Using Digital Image Correlation Method 437 Pengwan Chen, Zhongbin Zhou and Fenglei Huang Contents VII Part 5 Modelling 461 Chapter 19 Virtual Crack Closure Technique and Finite Element Method for Predicting the Delamination Growth Initiation in Composite Structures 463 Pietropaoli Elisa Chapter 20 Experimental and Numerical Methods to Characterize Electrical Behaviour of Carbon Fiber Composites Used in Aeronautic Industry 481 Alexandre Piche, Ivan Revel and Gilles Peres Chapter 21 Adaptive Composite Materials: Bionics Principles, Abnormal Elasticity, Moving Interfaces 497 Shilko Serge Chapter 22 Mechanics of Composite Beams 527 Mehdi Hajianmaleki and Mohammad S. Qatu Chapter 23 Asymptotic Expansion Homogenisation and Multiscale Topology Optimisation of Composite Structures 547 João A. Oliveira, Joaquim Pinho-da-Cruz and Filipe Teixeira-Dias Preface Nature creates the best material constituents and combines them as composite materials. Thus inspired people compose new designs for their purpose of utilization. We make new constructions, new types of man-made materials and evaluate them before use. Composites are made up of constituent materials with high engineering potential. This potential is wide as wide is the variation of materials and structure constructions when new updates are invented every day. Technological advances in composite field are included in the equipment surrounded us daily; our lives are getting safer, hand in hand with economical and ecological advantages. This book collects original studies concerning composite materials, their properties and testing from various points of view. Chapters are divided into five groups according to their main aim: Material properties, Natural sources, Manufacturing, Testing and Modelling. Each part includes chapters with interesting topics. Worldwide spread authors were addressed so we are glad that this book represents research in high variety of outlooks. Material properties are described in innovative ways either for standard components or biomaterials and natural sources materials. Commonly used materials as glass, carbon, epoxy resins, concrete, etc. were described with improved properties or constructions. Waste material using and recycling is the next step and it is an important way how to save our sources and environment. Renewable natural sources are on the top position for saving environment and we have to do our best to find proper applications for them. Manufacturing processes are represented by moulding methods; lamination process includes monitoring during process. Innovative testing procedures are described in electrochemistry, ultrasonic pulse velocity, fracture toughness in macro-micro mechanical behaviour and more. Synergy between components, laminas and construction parts are tested by different principles. Modelling offers relatively cheap option how to observe long time processes in special conditions before actual production. Experimental testing with software modelling and computation are important to work together for deep description of composite properties. All original contributions included in this book present knowledge and research in very special field. Big progress in composite engineering started in the second part of X Preface the last century and is still growing. Study of composite materials has future when questions which we consider now are going to be answered and limitations which we see will be overcome. I would like to thank Romina Krebel for her invaluable help in the organisation of the editing process. Pavla Těšinová Technical University of Liberec Czech Republic