Water Resistance and Creep Behavior of Heat-Treated Moso Bamboo Determined by the Stepped Isostress Method.

Teng-Chun Yang,Tung-Lin Wu,Chin-Hao Yeh

doi:10.3390/polym13081264

Abstract

The influence of heat treatment on the physico-mechanical properties, water resistance, and creep behavior of moso bamboo (Phyllostachys pubescens) was determined in this study. The results revealed that the density, moisture content, and flexural properties showed negative relationships with the heat treatment temperature, while an improvement in the dimensional stability (anti-swelling efficiency and anti-water absorption efficiency) of heat-treated samples was observed during water absorption tests. Additionally, the creep master curves of the untreated and heat-treated samples were successfully constructed using the stepped isostress method (SSM) at a series of elevated stresses. Furthermore, the SSM-predicted creep compliance curves fit well with the 90-day full-scale experimental data. When the heat treatment temperature increased to 180 °C, the degradation ratio of the creep resistance (rd) significantly increased over all periods. However, the rd of the tested bamboo decreased as the heat treatment temperature increased up to 220 °C.

Highlights

Bamboo has been of interest in academia and industry as a natural resource due to its fast growth rate compared to other plants and because it is an eco-friendly and renewable material
The results showed that the density loss rate (DLR) was 4.0% when the bamboo sample was heated at 180 ◦C (MOT180)
The present study investigated the influence of heat treatment temperature on the physico-mechanical properties and creep behavior of moso bamboo

Summary

Introduction

Bamboo has been of interest in academia and industry as a natural resource due to its fast growth rate compared to other plants and because it is an eco-friendly and renewable material. Bamboo has a high hygroscopicity and low biological durability since it is a lignocellulosic material To resolve these drawbacks, heat treatment, which is a physical and eco-friendly modification, has been considered in the bamboo-based product industry. Several previous studies have treated the bamboo under various temperatures, durations, and media (air, nitrogen, oil, and steam) [8,9,10,11] The findings of these studies indicated that heat treatment decreases the hygroscopicity of bamboo and improves its dimensional stability, but it reduces the mechanical properties. Brito et al [13] affirmed that heat treatment improved biological resistance of bamboo to brown rot fungi, but not to termites These previous studies mainly focused on physico-mechanical properties and biological durability of the heat-treated bamboo. The available information on the creep behaviors of the heat-treated bamboo lacks detail

Methods

Results

Conclusion