# Development and Mechanical Characterization of a Jute Fiber-Reinforced Polyester Composite Helmet Produced by Vacuum Infusion

## TL;DR

This paper develops and tests a jute fiber-reinforced polyester helmet using vacuum infusion, evaluating how different joining methods and layer thickness affect its mechanical performance.

## Contribution

The novelty is applying vacuum infusion to a full-scale natural-fiber helmet and systematically analyzing joining strategies and mechanical correlations.

## Key findings

- Four-layer hybrid laminates showed the best balance of strength, stiffness, and deformation.
- Increasing laminate thickness improved stiffness by up to 87.3% under lateral compression.
- Seamless configurations achieved the highest tensile loads for both two and four layers.

## Abstract

This study presents the development and mechanical characterization of a full-scale helmet manufactured from a polyester matrix composite reinforced with woven jute fabric using vacuum infusion. Laminates with two and four reinforcement layers were produced and assembled using four joining configurations: seamless, stitched, bonded, and hybrid (bonded + stitched). Tensile tests were performed according to ASTM D3039, while frontal and lateral compression tests followed ABNT NBR 7471, aiming to evaluate the influence of laminate thickness and joining strategy on mechanical performance. In tension, the seamless configuration reached maximum loads of 0.80 kN (two layers) and 1.60 kN (four layers), while the hybrid configuration achieved 0.79 kN and 1.43 kN, respectively. Stitched and bonded joints showed lower strength. Under compression, increasing the laminate thickness from two to four layers reduced frontal elongation from 15.09 mm to 9.97 mm and lateral elongation from 13.73 mm to 7.24 mm, corresponding to stiffness gains of 50.3% and 87.3%, respectively. Statistical analysis (ANOVA/Tukey, α = 0.05) confirmed significant effects of thickness and joint configuration. Although vacuum infusion is a well-established process, the novelty of this work lies in its application to a full-scale natural-fiber helmet, combined with a systematic evaluation of joining strategies and a direct correlation between standardized tensile behavior and structural compression performance. The four-layer hybrid laminate exhibited the best balance between strength, stiffness, and deformation capacity.