Agro-Residues: Surface Treatment and Characterization of Date Palm Tree Fiber as Composite Reinforcement

Elsayed A Elbadry

doi:10.1155/2014/189128

Abstract

The aims of this research are to investigate the effect of different surface treatment methods on the different properties of date palm fiber (DPF) compared to raw DPF fibers such as surface morphology, density, thermal stability, and tensile properties. The first surface treatment is called surface hand cleaning which can be carried out by cleaning the fibers by soft sand cloth; the second one is the same as the first one after DPF heat treatment in the furnace at 100°C for 1.5 h and the third one is by chemical treatment with 1% NaOH at 100°C for 1 h. The results showed that the mechanical performance of DPF was enhanced by the different treatments and the chemical treatment has pronounced effect on the behavior of DPF. Raw fibers showed the highest variability and presented the lowest value of Weibull modulus, whereas the fibers showed less variability by carrying out the different treatments. Moreover, using soda treatment cleans the fiber surface which causes fibrillation and therefore the tensile strength of the fibers increases.

Highlights

Due to environment and sustainability considerations, the development of high-performance materials made from natural resources is increasing worldwide
It can be seen that by carrying out all treatments the fiber density increases compared to the density of raw fiber due to the ability to remove the dusts and impurities
The chemical treatment has the largest value of the density due to the ability of the chemical solution to extract soluble products expected to be of low molecular weight

Summary

Introduction

Due to environment and sustainability considerations, the development of high-performance materials made from natural resources is increasing worldwide. The greatest challenge in working with natural fiber reinforced plastic composites is lower CO2 emission compared to that of synthetic fibers [1]. The use of natural plant fibers as reinforcement in fiber-reinforced plastics is receiving more attention recently, because of their advantages such as renewability, low density, and high specific strength. There are some disadvantages associated with the use of natural fibers as reinforcement in polymer composites. These include the incompatibility between fibers and polymer matrices, tendency to form aggregates during processing and poor moisture resistance, and so forth [2,3,4]

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Results

Conclusion