Textile composites from hydro-entangled non-woven fabrics

Production of non-woven fabrics and composite technology are not new areas. However it seems very little has been done to look at the potential of hyd ro-entangled non-wovens as reinforcements in structural composites. A preli minary investigation is reported of the suitability of hydro-entangled non- woven fabrics as fibre reinforcements in producing structural composites. W ork reported involved producing various composite materials by impregnating hydro-entangled fibrous structure with a suitable polymer and evaluating t he composite properties via a number of tests, such as tensile strength and impact resistance. Preliminary results show that there is good potential f or producing composite structures from hydro-entangled non-wovens. (C) 2000 Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.