Sound Absorption Properties of Dwi Matrix Renewable and Synthetic Polymer

Abstract

This research is to study the acoustic property of biopolymer foam and commercial consumer petroleum based epoxy foam. This is to evaluate the influence of proportion ratio of polymers matrix and filler namely as Titanium Dioxide (TiO2) towards the sound absorption coefficient (α) at different frequencies level (Hz). Biopolymer foam was prepared based on in-house synthesized monomer from vegetable oil with commercial polymethane diphenyl diisocyanate (Modified Polymeric-MDI) with the different proportion ratio of TiO2. The acoustic property of samples was examined by using an impedance tube test according to ASTM E-1050 of sound absorption coefficient (α). It was observed that epoxy gives higher value of α that is 0.9995 but shifted to higher absorption frequencies level as the TiO2 loading increased. Meanwhile the lowest composition ratio of TiO2 loading in biopolymer foam gives the best value of α at the lowest absorption frequency level as compared to epoxy composition ratios. Evidently, different percentage ratio of TiO2 varied α value which influence the absorption frequency level (Hz). Hence, the minimal alteration on the filler loading of epoxy or biopolymer greatly influences the acoustic performance of both polymers. Meanwhile, the commercial foam of noise reduction coefficient, NRC values of commercial foam were decreasing with the increasing proportion ratio of TiO2 while, the NRC values ​​of biopolymer foam were increased as the TiO2 ratio was increased. This is due to the sound coefficient in polymeric foam is related to the effect of the interaction between different characteristic for both material (biopolymer foam and commercial foam) and morphology of foam.