Potential utilization of recycled waste paper fibres in cement composites

Abstract

This paper deals with the utilization of waste paper fibres in cement composites. The characterization of waste cellulosic fibres, their processing methods as well as the density and mechanical properties of cement-based composites with the 2 and 5 wt% fibre content of three fibre kinds compared to a composite based on 99.5 wt.% cellulosic fibre and the control sample without fibres are presented. It is shown that the density and mechanical properties of tested fibre-cement composites are affected by cellulosic fibre content and depend on the nature of fibres, their dimension and dispersion in the matrix. The density of each composite with fibre content was checked in a narrow range (1921–1968 kg/m 3 at 2 % and 5 % replacement of the filler). Composites with recycled waste paper fibres had an increasing character in the values of flexural strength up to 14.9 % in comparison with the wood pulp mortar sample. The compressive strength of composites with 2 % of filler replacement reached up to 18 MPa. However, the 5 % replacement of the filler caused a reduction in the compressive strength values to 7.5 % in comparison with the sample containing wood pulp after 28 days of hardening. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.ct.67.1.15001