Over the last thirty years composite materials, plastics, and ceramics have been the dominant emerging materials. The volume and number of applications of composite materials have grown steadily, penetrating and conquering new markets relentlessly. Modern composite materials constitute a significant proportion of the engineered materials market ranging from everyday products to sophisticated niche applications. Today high performance fibre reinforced plastics (FRP) are starting to challenge those ubiquitous materials such as steel & aluminium in everyday applications as diverse as automobile bodies and civil infrastructure. However, continuous advances in the manufacturing technologies and performance of FRP have intensified the competition in a growing range of applications leading to significant growth in its market acceptance. Each type of composite brings its own performance characteristics that are typically suited for specific applications. Lightweight corrosion resistant materials such as FRP could provide an important contribution to the safe, economical development of resources. The need for new markets has spurred renewed efforts in reducing the cost of both raw materials and manufacturing processes, making composites more competitive to use in civil infrastructure applications. Composite as Building Materials Composites present immense opportunities to play increasing role as an alternate material to replace timber, steel, aluminium and concrete in buildings. Their benefits of corrosion resistance and low weight have proven attractive in many low stress applications. The use of high performance FRP in primary structural applications, however, has been slower to gain acceptance although there is much development activity. Composite is being used for the manufacture of prefabricated, portable and modular buildings as well as for exterior cladding panels, which can simulate masonry or stone. In interior applications, composites are used in the manufacture of shower enclosures and trays, baths, sinks, troughs and spas. Cast composite products are widely used for the production of vanity units, bench tops and basins. Indian Scenario Indian efforts centre around developing cost effective building materials as well as for catering to the housing needs of urban & rural poor. In this context, certain developments concerning glass fibre reinforced polymer composites, natural fibre composites, industrial waste based composites have assumed importance. The key restricting factors in the application of composites are initial costs due to raw materials and also inefficient conventional moulding processes. Industry & design experts are of the view that with the adoption of advanced technologies and some extent of standardization, these problems could be easily taken care of. Various key product applications being developed in the building & construction industry are prefabricated, portable & modular buildings, exterior cladding panels, interior decorations, furniture, bridges and architecture mouldings. Various proven composite products being used in the housing sector are bathtubs & basins, drainage channels, manhole covers, pits, farm buildings, doors, door frames & windows, cabinets, housing modular, sheeting roof and flat, structural members, portable toilets, ponds & fountains, water storage tanks etc. The following section deals with the development activities being carried out in various academic Institutions/R&D laboratories in India in partnership with industries. FRP Doors & Door Frames With the scarcity of wood for building products, the alternative, which merits attention, is to promote the manufacturing of low cost FRP building materials to meet the demands of the housing & building sectors. The doors made of FRP skins, sandwiched with core materials such as rigid polyurethane foam, expanded polystyrene, paper honeycomb, jute/coir felt etc. can have potential usage in residential buildings, offices, schools, hospitals, laboratories etc. Sandwich composite construction is popular in door fabrication due to their critical advantages such as high specific strength & stiffness, low weight, impact resistance and uniform smooth surfaces. The core in sandwich construction stabilizes the facings and carries most of the shear load. A low-density core made of honeycomb or foam materials provides a structural performance with minimum weight. Other considerations such as sound insulation, heat resistance, vibration-damping etc. dictate the particular choice of material used as core material. The FRP doors & doorframes have been designed & developed using the aforesaid technology by the RV-TIFAC Composite Design Centre (CDC) at Bangalore under a project launched by the Advanced Composites Mission of the Technology Information, Forecasting & Assessment Council (TIFAC) under the Department of Science & Technology (Govt. of India). A cost and weight analysis of FRP doors as well as conventional wooden doors was carried out by RV-TIFAC CDC and it was noted that replacing salwood door with FRP door could result in cost & weightsavings of 44.72% and 61.04% respectively. The FRP sandwich composite door designed and developed by the Centre was subjected to all the 18 tests and conforms to IS: 4020 standards. Pultruded Profiles Among a wide array of composite products, pultruded profiles are used in many structural applications. Pultruded sections are well-established alternative to steel, wood and aluminium in developed countries and are fast catching up in other parts of the world. Structural sections have ready markets in oil exploration rigs, chemical industries etc. The amount of energy required to fabricate FRP composite materials for structural applications with respect to conventional materials such as steel & aluminium is lower and would work for its economic advantage in the end. The pultruded products are already being recognized as commodity in the international market for construction. Under a project launched by the Advanced Composites Mission, FRP Pultruded Profiles with excellent surface finish and flame retardancy as per international standards have been developed by M/s. D K Fibre Forms Ltd., Pune. Products such as industrial gratings, solid rods for electrical insulation, cable-trays, ladders etc. have been fabricated.
