Efficacy of alkali-treated jute as fibre reinforcement in enhancing the mechanical properties of cement mortar

Abstract

Present investigation deals with the effectiveness of alkali-treated jute fibre reinforcement on the physical characteristics and mechanical properties of cementitious composites. The use of alkali-treated jute fibre as fibre reinforcement in cement composites leads to the enhancement of the compressive strength as well as flexural properties compared to that of the raw jute reinforced mortar as well as the control mortar counterpart. In this investigation, the compressive and flexural strengths of the control cement mortar (cured for 90 days) are measured to be 34.5 and 7.4 MPa, respectively. Whilst, the compressive and flexural strengths of the alkali-treated jute fibre reinforced cement mortar (cured for 90 days) are measured to be 36.2 and 10.4 MPa, respectively. Additionally, based on the analyses of the bending properties, it is assessed that the fracture toughness, toughness indices and post-cracking resistance energy of alkali-treated jute fibre reinforced mortar are improved by 1.5, 0.6 and 22.5 times, respectively, as compared to that of the control mortar. Whereas, the above properties of raw jute fibre reinforced mortar samples are improved by 1.4, 0.5 and 20.4 times, respectively, as compared to that of the control mortar counterpart. Finally, a model has been proposed to explain the overall performance of the alkali-treated jute fibre reinforced cement composites.