Investigation on the Mechanical Properties of Paper Water Hyacinth (Eichhornia Crassipes)

Abstract

The widely use of papers and for the promotion of conservation of the forest ecosystem in making papers from the falling of trees. This work is focused on the realization of paper and its mechanical properties. Water hyacinth (Eichornia crassipes) is aquatic plant with a high growth rate that usually cover the river surface and has an impact to the environment and other living things. The work done was to produce a paper from water hyacinth through cutting, grinding, refining, molding, the bleaching process and drying process we obtained different papers. In the realization process of the papers, we have used Hydrogen peroxides for the bleaching process to obtain white paper (Bleached paper). In our case we have both the bleached and the unbleached paper. Papers were successfully produced under experimental condition. Mechanical properties of each paper were investigated. The various density of paper water hyacinth plant of the bleached and unbleached was 21.68 g/m3 and 26.37 g/m3 respectively, average tensile rupture stress 1.337MPa & 0.405MPa and young modulus was found to be 36.278MPa and 17.604MPa, the elongation at break 4.744% and 2.879%, average moisture content of 4.82% to 9.59% and 3.57% to 6.62% respectively for the Unbleached and Bleached paper water hyacinth plant. For this reason, Unbleached Paper with certain different strength ranges could be considered to be applied as packaging, seedling pot, mulching or insulating material in advance application. The use of water hyacinth as biomass with the used of the roots and leaf shows a bulky structure. The study concludes that water hyacinth is a potential fiber for paper production especially in areas where it is abundant, but the tensile strength of unbleached paper is more than the bleached paper. So that the paper can be used for other purpose than writing.