Abstract
New materials based on wood have the advantage in the sense that their properties can be engineered so as to correspond to user demands. The properties which can be engineered are those relating both to their utilisation and machining, in particular - the tensile strength, elongation at break, modulus of elasticity and impact resistance. The research at the Faculty of Forestry and "Hipol" Chemical Industry related to the new type of wood-polypropylene composite. The content of wood filler was varied in the range between 40% and 70% mass contents of beech wood flour. After the highest tensile strength at 50% of filler content was determined, the effect of the wood filler origin was also examined at this content value. Therefore, wood flour of beech, poplar, acetylated pine and the waste MDF was used. The influence of the composition of the wood filler (beech combined with MDF, poplar and acetylated pine) in comparison with pure polypropylene matrix was also examined, as well as the effect of the type of coupling agent. Hopefully, the results obtained in this study might serve as the initial data for production of easily machined high-strength composites.
Highlights
There has recently been a dramatic increase of interest in using biomass such as wood or agricultural fibres as replacements for glass to reinforce thermoplastic composites, because the wood material offers several advantages over inorganic fillers, such as its low price, biodegradability, renewability, recycle-ability, low density, etc. (Bolton, 1994)
The results of examination of the quality improvement of the PP composites filled with 50% of the beech wood flour, with different type of coupling agent and peroxide concentration, are presented in Tab. 1
T he optimum content of wood flour (WF) particles in PP composites was found to be 50%. This high wood filler content is very favourable from the viewpoint of the composite price; 3
Summary
There has recently been a dramatic increase of interest in using biomass such as wood or agricultural fibres as replacements for glass to reinforce thermoplastic composites, because the wood material offers several advantages over inorganic fillers, such as its low price, biodegradability, renewability, recycle-ability, low density, etc. (Bolton , 1994). It is due to poor adhesion between the hydrophilic wood filler and hydrophobic thermoplastic This problem can be overcome by the modification of filler/matrix interface by suitable coupling agents coating on the surface of wood particles, polymer or both by compounding, blending, soaking, spraying, or other methods (L u et al, 2000). Review of wood - plastic composites showed that highly hydrophobic matrix improve the water resistance of such composites, but not enough. This is because of hydrophilic wood filler (Ta katani et al, 2000). The influence of concentration of commercial coupling agents like silane (A-1100) and MAPP on mechanical properties of W/PP composites has been evaluated. The effect of acetylated wood filler for potential exterior use of W/PP composites were investigated too
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