A Preliminary Study on Acoustical Performance of Oil Palm Mesocarp Natural Fiber

Abstract

As the population increases, the demand of a comfortable environmental such as sound pollution is getting higher. Sound pollutions also have become worsen and creating concerns for many peoples. Due to this problem, synthetic materials as acoustic absorbers still applied as commonly acoustical panels and this material may hazardous to human health and contribute significantly a pollution to the environments. However, researchers have interested in conducting their research on natural fiber to be an alternative sound absorber. This study investigated the potential of oil palm Mesocarp fiber for sound absorbing material. The Mesocarp fibers were mixed with polyurethane (PU) as binder with ratio of 70:30. The thickness was varied in 10mm, 20mm, 30mm, and 40mm. This study also investigated the air gap of 5mm and 10mm in the sound absorption performance. Impedance Tube Method was used to measure sound absorption coefficient (a). The measurement was done on accordance with ASTM E1050-98, which is the standard test method for impedance and absorption of acoustical materials using a tube. The results showed that the optimum value for Mesocarp fiber is 0.93. The optimum value obtained at 5000 Hz. The influence of air gap increases the sound absorption especially from 250 Hz to 4000 Hz. These results indicate that fiber from Mesocarp is promising to be used sound absorbing material.