Percentage Of Sawdust Research Articles

Performance of Waste Paper as a Substrate for Oyster Mushroom (Pleurotus ostreatus L.) Cultivation

Purpose: Cultivation of Pleurotus spp. (Oyster mushroom) is economically feasible, exploiting its great capacity to degrade cellulose, lignin and hemicelluloses present in organic wastes. Waste paper is a very common pollutant thrown as garbage with no recycling plan in the environment. In view of the growing importance of food security and environmental sanitation this study was conducted to evaluate the performance of waste paper as a substrate for cultivation of Oyster mushroom (Pleurotus ostreatus L.), supplemented with sawdust and wheat bran. Methods: Pure culture of Pleurotus ostreatus was propagated using sterilized wheat grain as substrate for spawn preparation. The collected waste paper along with the saw dust and wheat bran was mixed as per the design [three different substrate mixtures/treatments (T-1, T-2 and T-3) were prepared], composted for a week, filled in polyethene bags and sterilized. Substrate bags were inoculated with Oyster spawn and incubated in a cultivation room with controlled conditions (light, temperature, humidity and ventilation). Data for growth parameters (number of days for primordia growth, number of fruiting bodies per bag, crop yield, biological efficiency and contamination rate) were recoded for each bag of each treatment, compared against the control group (records of evaluated parameters from the mushroom extension unit) and were analyzed statistically using two-factor Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) with replication technique. Results: Treatment-3 (waste paper supplied with saw dust and wheat bran) showed high performance in terms of mean crop yield (150.58 ± 1.2g) and BE (43.1 ± 1.1%); while Treatment-1(waste paper alone without any supplement) scores lower BE (17.3±2.1%). Based on the Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) this study shows that all the growth parameters were found significantly different at p-value (p < 0.01) considering each growth parameter among the treatments. Conclusion: Therefore, waste paper along with required percentage of sawdust and wheat bran can be used as alternative substrate for cultivation of this prized mushroom reducing substrate expenses, adding a new food recipe to nutritional cuisine and reducing waste paper pollution on the environment on the other hand.

ANALYSIS OF TIMBERCRETE: SAWDUST-INFUSED CONCRETE MIXTURES

This investigation aims to advance sustainable construction practices by investigating the feasibility and environmental benefits of incorporating sawdust instead of sand in concrete mixtures. By using sawdust, a byproduct of the forestry industry, in the process of making concrete, the investigation addresses the pressing need for resource conservation and waste reduction, since the construction sector is a significant user of raw materials. According to British European Norm Standard BS 8500-2:2023 for C35 grade concrete, the experimental programme examines how different percentages of sawdust (0%, 5%, 10%, 15%, 20%, and 25%) substituted for sand affect the physical characteristics of concrete, including its compressive strength, dry density, and water absorption. The workability, consistency, and strength of the sawdust-incorporated concrete mixes were assessed by a combination of techniques including sieve analysis, slump testing, casting and curing procedures, and compression tests. The results indicate a potential reduction in material costs and environmental impact with the ideal sawdust content by showing a negative association between the amount of sawdust and the concrete's density and compressive strength. A larger sawdust content was associated with higher rates of water absorption, highlighting the hygroscopic nature of sawdust and its implications for the durability of concrete. According to the investigation's results, it is possible to substitute concrete with up to 5% sawdust, providing an environmentally friendly alternative to conventional concrete while still having sufficient mechanical properties for use in construction. It is recommended that further research be conducted to improve sawdust's compatibility with cementitious materials, increase the durability of sawdust-incorporated concrete, and create industry guidelines for its use. This investigation contributes to the body of knowledge on environmentally friendly building materials by promoting the use of sawdust and other eco-friendly substitutes in the building sector to reduce negative effects on the environment and increase resource efficiency.

Comparative Study on Concrete with Sawdust as a Partial Replacement for Sand by Conventional and Self-curing Methods

The environment is threatened by the large-scale mining of natural resources like sand. Therefore, it becomes necessary for us to consider using industrial by-products instead of natural materials in order to save the ecosystem. In this study utilization of saw dust generated by wood industry in concrete has been explored. The purpose of making sawdust concrete is to decrease the waste of sawdust, which could protect the environment in the long run. Concrete is most widely used material in the construction industry, it needs a lot of water for its curing, so it is an urgent need of research to minimize the use of water to cure concrete. Since we identify water shortage is mounting day by day, so vital research should be needed to do the curing without water. So the self-curing method is adopted to minimize the usage of water and it can be adopted where there is acute shortage of water. As the percentage of sawdust content increased from 10% to 20% the compressive strength decreased. Optimum replacement of sand with sawdust has been found to be 10%. By comparison between conventionally and self- cured concrete with respect to its compressive strength and density, compressive strength of conventionally cured concrete gives better result than self-cured concrete. There is reduction in density of sawdust concrete with increase in percentage of sawdust in concrete and also there is decrease in density of self-cured concrete as compared with conventionally cured concrete.

Sawdust-Based Concrete Composite-Filled Steel Tube Beams: An Experimental and Analytical Investigation

Incorporating waste byproducts into concrete is an innovative and promising way to minimize the environmental impact of waste material while maintaining and/or improving concrete’s mechanical characteristics and strength. The proper application of sawdust as a pozzolan in the building industry remains a significant challenge. Consequently, this study conducted an experimental evaluation of sawdust as a fill material. In particular, sawdust as a fine aggregate in concrete offers a realistic structural and economical possibility for the construction of lightweight structural systems. Failure under four-point loads was investigated for six concrete-filled steel tube (CFST) specimens. The results indicated that recycled lightweight concrete performed similarly to conventional concrete when used as a filler material in composite steel tube beams. The structural effects of sawdust substitution on ultimate load and initial stiffness were less substantial than the relative changes in the material properties, and the ultimate capacity of the tested samples decreased moderately as the substitution percentage of sawdust increased. Moreover, the maximum load capacity was observed to decrease by 6.43–30.71% for sawdust replacement levels between 5% and 45.1% across all tested samples. Additionally, when using lightweight concrete with 5% sawdust, the moment value of the CFST sample was reduced by 6.4%. Notably, the sawdust CFST samples exhibited a flexural behavior that was relatively comparable to that of the standard CFST samples.

Investigating the fresh and mechanical properties of wood sawdust-modified lightweight geopolymer concrete

Geopolymer concrete has developed as a potential alternative to ordinary Portland cement-based concrete, wherein various industrial by-products have been converted as beneficial spin-offs. Apart from appropriate compressive strength in the construction sector worldwide, the durability, sound absorption, thermal conductivity, and weight of concrete are also major concerns. Lightweight geopolymer concretes have gained attention because of their superior strength, durability, lower environmental impact, and sustainable characteristics. In this view, the current study examined the feasibility of using sawdust as a natural fine and coarse aggregate substitution in fly ash (FA)-granulated blast furnace slag (GBFS) based geopolymer concrete. Four mixes with a different percentage of sawdust (25, 50, 75, and 100) substituting natural aggregate were designed to examine the effects of sawdust on fresh and hardened features of geopolymer concrete compared to those conventional FA-GBFS-based geopolymer concrete with natural aggregate. Sodium silicate (NS) and sodium hydroxide (NH) (with NS/NH ratio of 0.75) were utilized to dissolve the alumina silicate from FA and GBFS. Informational models were developed using an experimental dataset to estimate the compressive strength of geopolymer concrete mix designs. Besides, using the weight of the developed network, a global sensitivity (GS) analysis was developed to identify the sensitivity of compressive strength to the waste sawdust content. Test results confirmed that by substituting natural aggregate with 100% sawdust, there was around a 35% decrease in compressive strength. Nevertheless, the sound absorption coefficient was increased by an average of 38% in frequencies range between 1800 and 2500 HZ, and thermal conductivity decreased by around 4.5 times once the natural aggregate was substituted by 100% sawdust.

Push-out test of waste sawdust-based steel-concrete – Steel composite sections: Experimental and environmental study

Considering their cost and strength benefits over traditional reinforced concrete, steel–concrete–steel (SCS) structural systems have become increasingly popular. The ultimate strength, ductility index, failure modes, cost, environment, and energy absorption capacities of SCS filled with sawdust concrete were explored in this study to better understand the impact of using SCS in modern structural projects. Wood chips were employed as an infill material to minimize the section's weight and expense. Push-out monotonic loading was used to inspect the mechanical characteristics of six SCS samples. One sample was built using the typical normal-weight concrete core to serve as a standard, while the other samples were made with changed core materials by partially replacing the fine aggregate with sawdust. The discovered failure modes are explained and analyzed, with the ultimate strength, ductility, and energy absorption index. The research suggests that recycled lightweight infill concrete has a slightly lesser effect on the performance of the SCS than conventional concrete (less than 10 %). It was observed that the percentage of sawdust had an impact on the specimens' compressive strengths, with the strength decreasing from 65 to 48 MPa as the sawdust levels climbed from 7.27 % to 29.63 %. The energy absorption of the SCS sawdust concrete was lower than the control sample. Conversely, the ductility index of the control specimen was higher than those of waste wood SCS samples. The results also revealed that using sawdust material has a positive impact on the economic and environmental systems.

Natural Ball Clay Ceramic Membrane Fabrication Using Full Factorial Design for Screening

AbstractA screening design is used to assess a large number of process or design parameters to identify the most influential factors that affect the process performance. This study investigates factors affecting the fabrication of natural ball clay (NBC) ceramic membranes using the 24 full factorial design (FFD) with two replications at each point. The factors studied were: particle size of the sawdust, percentage of sawdust, amount of binder, and sintering temperature. The FFD study results indicated that the sawdust particle size and the percentage of sawdust had a positive impact on the porosity and mechanical strength of the NBC ceramic membrane. This demonstrates the importance of performing a screening experiment prior to an extensive investigation of certain factors such as in the optimization studies.

Sawdust Recycling in the Development of Permeable Clay Paving Bricks: Optimizing Mixing Ratio and Particle Size

The permeable pavement system (PPS) has effectively contributed to stormwater management as a low-impact development (LID) technology. The suitability of clay bricks, consolidated with waste materials, for sustainable PPS applications in urban infrastructure needs further attention. In this study, several series of permeable clay paving bricks samples were prepared by mixing different ratios and particle sizes of sawdust (SD) with clay soil and firing at 900 °C. The raw soil and SD samples were characterized through sieve analysis, X-ray Fluorescence (XRF), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Fourier-Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR). The bricks were tested for their compressive strength, bulk density, apparent porosity, water adsorption, permeability coefficient, and stormwater treatment efficiency. The clay soil comprised 17.5% clay/silt with appropriate amounts of SiO2 (50.47%), Al2O3 (19.14%), and fluxing agents (15.34%) and was suitable for brick manufacturing. XRD and FTIR analysis revealed that the soil predominantly comprises quartz, dolomite calcite, feldspar, kaolinite, illite, and chlorites. The SD samples were enriched with amorphous and crystalline cellulose. The compressive strength of the bricks decreased, while the permeability of the bricks increased with an increasing percentage of SD. An optimal percentage of 10% SD achieved a 21.2 MPa compressive strength and a 0.0556 m/s permeability coefficient, meeting the ASTM specifications for PPS. The optimal size of SD, between 0.5 and 1.0 mm, achieved the desired compressive strength of the bricks. The permeable bricks effectively removed the total suspended solids (TSS), turbidity, and BOD5 from the stormwater, which complies with the guidelines for wastewater reuse applications.

Cost effective light weight concrete with saw dust and brick ballast

Use of conventional material such as cement, sand and gravel for the production of concrete has increased their demand and so created shortage of material and escalated the cost. In this study the locally available waste materials like Saw dust and Brick Ballast are used to partially replace the river sand and gravels respectively to produce light weight and low cost concrete with optimum strength. The different combinations of concrete with 4%, 8% and 12% Saw Dust (SD) and 8%, 16% and 24% Brick Ballast (BB) are being used and compared with normal concrete of M30 grade, where partial replacement of river sand and coarse aggregates are done by saw dust and brick ballast respectively. Concrete is tested for density, workability and compressive strength and a comparative analysis is done in terms of their physical properties and cost savings. It has been observed from the study that on increase in percentage of sawdust and brick ballast in concrete lead to a corresponding reduction in workability and compressive strength. The optimum mix founded is with 4% of sawdust and 24% of Brick ballast having compressive strength of 32.13 N/sq. mm with the weight reduction of 10.54% and the cost reduction of 5.46%. This optimum mix concrete can be used for lean concrete works like PCC in foundation, Flooring, Tile making. This research will not only enrich the domain but will also be very helpful in sustainable development of the nation.

Compressive Strength Performance of Composite Sand Cement Brick with Power Saw Wood

Malaysia is experiencing an unprecedented growth of its urban centre due to its developing economy and industrialization, causing the demand of bricks production to be high. This increased the price of river sand. Further, the river sand may be depleted in the future if there is no alternative taken in reducing the usage of river sand in building materials due to the limited natural resources supply. Therefore, this research concentrates on using waste material like wood fiber waste (WFW) in order to reduce river sand in the fabrication of composite sand cement brick. This research is done in order to determine the water absorption and the compressive strength of sand cement brick with powder saw wood. Six batches of bricks were made with different composition of sawdust of 0%, 1%, 2%, 3%, 4% and 5% sawdust. All the bricks undergo 7 days of air-cured process before having the water absorption test and compression test. 3 days of water-cured process was performed on all bricks in order to investigate the results of water absorption test. For water absorption test, 0% of sawdust brick shows the lowest value while 5% of sawdust brick shows the highest value of water absorption rate. This indicated that high percentages of sawdust in composite brick will results in higher water absorption rate. This factor is due to the sawdust that is hydrophilic and porous in nature that causes the brick to containe more air space in the brick. Thus, this can be evidenced by the density data that keep decreasing with increasing percentages of sawdust. As for compressive strength test, the results presented 0%, 1%, 2%, 3%, 4% and 5% of sawdust have strength of 20.61 MPa, 25.30 MPa, 15.47 MPa, 2.03 MPa, 1.49 MPa and 1.73 MPa respectively. In summary, it can be concluded that optimum percentage of sawdust is 2% as it contains better compressive strength than other bricks although it has slightly higher water absorption rate than conventional sand cement brick. The compressive strength was influenced by the density of brick. It is shown in density results that decreasing in density will causes declining in compressive strength. As a conclusion, water absorption rate increases linearly proportional to the percentages of sawdust but inversely proportional to the compressive strength and the density of the brick.

Processing and characterization of chemically modified wood sawdust reinforced (diospyros, dialium) epoxy composites

AbstractPolymer composite materials based on natural fiber such as wood had been widely used for research purposes and engineering interests. The interest in wood reinforced polymer composites had grown quickly due to their better performance in aspects of mechanical properties compared to pure wood. In this study, wood sawdust of diospyros (kayu malam) and dialium (keranji) were chosen to be incorporated into an epoxy‐based polymer composite. The wood is made into sawdust, which was treated with boric acid and hydrogen peroxide. Surface treatment with these reagents was used to improve the mechanical properties of the polymer composite compared to untreated wood polymer composite. Sawdust reinforced epoxy composite that was fabricated are with different weight percentages from 0 % (no wood), 5 %, 10 %, 15 % to 20 % wt % for comparison on their tensile, flexural, and impact strength properties. Tensile, flexural, and impact tests were performed to determine the changes in mechanical properties where it was found that tensile strength had increased by 34 percent with an optimum keranji and kayu malam fiber weight of 15 wt % for both boric acid and hydrogen peroxide treatments. For flexural strength, in both wood fibers, the optimum fiber weight was found to 15 wt %, and the addition of wood had increased the strength by 57 percent. As for impact strength, it decreased as the weight of fiber increased, where it was assumed that the addition of wood might have increased the crack initiation. Adhesive bonding between hydrophilic wood sawdust and the hydrophobic epoxy polymer was the phenomenon that was focused on this research. The range of optimum weight percentage of sawdust would be determined from the experiment result.

Influence of Sawdust Particle Sizes on the Physico-Mechanical Properties of Unfired Clay Blocks

Sawdust, which is a waste/by-product of the wood/timber industry, can be utilised as a valuable raw material in building material production due to its abundance and low cost. However, the application of sawdust in the manufacture of unfired clay blocks has received little investigation. Furthermore, the impact of different sawdust particle sizes on the properties of unfired clay blocks has not been studied. Therefore, this study screened sawdust at three different particle sizes: SP-a (212 μm < x < 300 μm), SP-b (425 μm < x < 600 μm) and SP-c (1.18 mm < x < 2.00 mm), to examine their effects on the physical and mechanical properties of unfired clay blocks. The density, linear shrinkage, capillary water absorption and flexural and compressive strengths were among the tests performed. Different sawdust percentages, i.e., 2.5%, 5%, 7.5% and 10% of the total weight of the clay, were considered. The tests results show that when sawdust was added to the mixture, the density of the samples reduced for all particle sizes. However, the linear shrinkage increased in SP-a samples but decreased in the other two particle size samples as the sawdust percentage increased from 2.5% to 10%. On the other hand, the capillary water absorption coefficient increased while the strength decreased with increasing sawdust content for all three groups. The highest compressive strength (CS) and flexural strength (FS) were achieved at 2.5% of sawdust content. Furthermore, it was observed that SP-b (CS—4.74 MPa, FS—2.00 MPa) samples showed the highest strength followed by SP-a (CS—4.09 MPa, FS—1.69 MPa) and SP-c (CS—3.90 MPa, FS—1.63 MPa) samples. Consequently, good-quality unfired clay blocks can be manufactured using sawdust up to 2.5% with particle sizes ranging between 600 and 425 μm.

PROPAGACIÓN VEGETATIVA DE Pinus patula SCHIEDE ex SCHLTDL. et CHAM. EN DIFERENTES SUSTRATOS

Pinus patula Schiede ex Schldl. et Cham. es una especie endémica de México utilizada en plantaciones forestales comerciales en Sudamérica y Sudáfrica. La propagación masiva de materiales mejorados de esta especie, a través de estacas enraizadas, permite aumentar su productividad y homogeneizar sus productos. Se compararon cinco sustratos a base de aserrín fresco y corteza de pino en diferentes proporciones (1:9, 3:7, 5:5, 7:3 y 9:1 v:v) para evaluar el enraizamiento de estacas de esta especie forestal. Se utilizó un diseño experimental de bloques completos al azar con cuatro repeticiones; la unidad experimental estuvo conformada por 25 estacas. Se analizaron las principales características físicas y químicas de los sustratos tales como porosidad total, porosidad de aireación, retención de humedad, densidad aparente, pH, conductividad eléctrica y capacidad de intercambio catiónico al inicio y al final del experimento. Las variables evaluadas fueron la supervivencia, enraizamiento, presencia de callo, número y longitud de raíces primarias y presencia de raíces secundarias a las 20 semanas de establecido el experimento. El sustrato con la mayor proporción de aserrín (9:1) presentó el porcentaje de enraizamiento de las estacas más elevado (77 %), en comparación con el testigo (1:9), donde se obtuvo 42 %. Se observó alta correlación (0.97, 0.97, 0.90) del enraizado con el porcentaje de aserrín, densidad aparente y pH, respectivamente. La mezcla de aserrín y corteza de pino (9:1) presentó características físicas y químicas apropiadas para la formulación de sustratos útiles para propagar P. patula mediante el enraizado de estacas.

Effects of Chip Type on the Properties of Chip-Sawdust Boards Glued with Polymeric Diphenyl Methane Diisocyanate.

This study investigates the effects of chip type and sawdust percentage on physical and mechanical properties of chip–sawdust boards. The used wood chips varied in linear dimensions and original source. The origin determined the wood quality, which translated into the chips’ linear dimensions. The used materials were chips from sawmill waste processing, aggregate processing of sawmill wood, and chips intended for medium-density boards. The experiment demonstrated that the best boards in terms of mechanical properties were obtained from 4-mm-thick chips with 30% sawdust content and a density of 850 kg/m3. These boards meet the requirements of the EN 312 (2010) standard for P5 boards.

Physical and mechanical properties of sawdust cement mortar treated with hypochlorite

In this study properties of cement mortar containing sawdust have been studied. Different percentages of sawdust have been used as (10%, 20%, 30%, 40%, 50%) of the total volume of dry contents. Sawdust used has been collected as a by-product of carpentry factories and has been used in three ways: first pure sawdust second treated with hypochlorite without washing and the third is treated with hypochlorite and washed with water and dried. Compressive strength test has been performed at 7 days and 28 days, while flexural strength, dry density and absorption have been performed at 28 days. The results showed an enhancement of compressive strength, decrease in dry density and absorption for the mortar containing treated and washed sawdust with the increase of sawdust content in the mixture.

Thermal Performance and Characterization of a Sawdust-Clay Composite Material

In most research, scientists have been interested in the mechanical impact of sawdust on adobe bricks, mainly compressive strength. This present paper is devoted to the characterization of the thermal transport properties of clay-sawdust materials. To evaluate the thermal impact of sawdust on earthen building envelopes, clayey composites with different sawdust percentage additions were developed. The results show that sawdust positively affects the thermal properties of earthen blocks. Indeed, adding 10% of sawdust decreases the thermal conductivity of composites of 30% and improves the thermal resistance of earthen building envelopes of 31%, while reducing their density. Sawdust can therefore be used in smart lightweight brick manufacturing. The experimental results were used to analyze the thermodynamic behaviors of a residential building using Energy-Plus software. Findings results demonstrate that clay-sawdust composites can reduce the energy consumption of conventional and traditional residential buildings by 21% and 5.3%, respectively.

Effect of physical conditioners (sawdust) on the dewatering of faecal sludge using unplanted filter beds

Abstract The study was conducted at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi on bench scale, using drying beds to determine the effect of different percentages of sawdust as a bulking agent for the dewatering of faecal sludge. Different percentages of sawdust, 50%, 100%, 150% and 0% (control) by weight of TS of the faecal sludge, with TS of 26.93 g/l which was selected in previous studies, were mixed with the faecal sludge. The sawdust-faecal sludge mixture of 50%, 100%, 150% and 0% TS of faecal sludge dewatered at 5.3, 4.9, 3.9 and 5.6 days respectively with 150% being fastest to dewater. The 150% sawdust-faecal sludge treatment was most efficient with respect to removal of contaminant loads like TVS, SS, COD and NH 3 -N, but was least in TS and EC removal. The 150% sawdust-faecal sludge mixture showed the least organic matter accumulation rate in the top 10cm of the filter media, whereas the 0% was the highest. The percentage TVS of the biosolids produced were 70.1, 77.3, 80.6 and 66.3 for 50%, 100%, 150% and 0% sawdust-faecal sludge mixtures, leading to annual organic matter estimation of 359, 567, 987 and 225 (kg TVS/m 2 /year) respectively

Dynamic Properties of Sand-Sawdust Mixture for Modeling Deposit Soil

Soil mixtures with various materials such as scraps of rubber tire, iron powder, and synthetic fibers have been widely used in civil engineering for experimental research or infrastructure construction and maintenance. However, these materials are not only expensive, but may also result in environmental concerns. In recent years, sawdust, because of its light-weight, inexpensive, and environmental friendly characteristics, has frequently been used in the shaking table test to adjust the dynamic properties of experimental soil. However, the dynamic properties of a sand-sawdust mixture for the shaking table test are still unclear. In this paper, the dynamic properties and the hysteresis curve characteristics of the sand-sawdust mixture as well as the influence of the sawdust content and confining pressure on the dynamic properties were studied using a series of consolidated drained dynamic triaxial tests. The test results show that, with the increase of the shear strain, the shape of the hysteresis loops changes from symmetrical willow-leaf to asymmetry sharp-leaf. For a given confining pressure, both the shear modulus and damping ratio decreases as the sawdust percentage increases. It was observed that, with an increase in confining pressure, the shear modulus increased while the damping ratio decreased slightly in the shear strain range of 10−3 to 7×10−3. It was also observed that the maximum shear modulus increased as the confining pressure increased, while the maximum damping ratio remained nearly constant. In addition, both the maximum shear modulus and the maximum damping ratio decreased as the sawdust content increased. Finally, the normalized shear modulus and damping ratio were established, which can be used in simulations using the shaking table test.

Use of Sawdust Blended with Bentonite and Cement Mixtures to Retain Diesel Oil Contaminants as a Liner in a Landfill

This paper presents the use of sawdust (SD), an industrial waste blended with bentonite and Portland cement (PC) mixtures as a liner in a landfill, to minimize the migration of leachate contaminating the subsurface environment. An experimental programme has been evaluated to study the effect of SD content on the liquid limit (LL), free swell index (FSI), compaction, hydraulic conductivity and strength characteristics of blending with bentonite and PC mixtures. The deionized water (DIW) and diesel oil contaminant (DOC) were used as permeating fluids in the study. The LL, FSI, maximum dry density and strength of the mix blends decreased; on the other hand, the optimum moisture content and hydraulic conductivity increased with increase in SD content, respectively. On permeation of DOC for all the mix blends, lower hydraulic conductivity is obtained as compared to DIW. In addition to it, the UCS tests samples were examined for quantitative energy dispersive X-ray spectrometer at 0-, 14- and 28-day curing period. It reveals the increase in Ca/Si ratio and decrease in Al/Ca ratio resulted in the strength improvement with an increase in the curing period. Powdered X-ray diffraction analysis suggested the formation of the hydrated cementitious product in the mix blends. Based on the results obtained from the study, the optimum percentage of sawdust to be effectively used as liner to prevent groundwater contamination was found to be less than or equal to 20%.

Effect of Moulding Pressure on Brake Lining Produced from Industrial Waste Material: Sawdust

In this study, asbestos-free brake lining was developed with sawdust. Sawdust was considered an alternative to asbestos, whose dust is carcinogenic. The sawdust from hard wood (mahogany and iroko trees) and other components such as abrasive, reinforcer, lubricant, were sieved into grade of 100 µm and used in production of brake linings. The percentages of sawdust for the samples are 40, 45, 50, 55, and 60. The percentages of abrasives (silicon carbides) were 27, 22, 17, 12 and 7, while binder (resins) lubricant (steel dust) and carbon black (reinforcer) were constant at 13%, 15% and 5% respectively on each sample. The molding pressure load was varied at 10 Mg, 20 Mg, 40 Mg, 60 Mg and 80 Mg during compression process. The brake lining properties examined are hardness, compressive strength and density. Also, the effects of molding pressure on these properties were evaluated. The results obtained show that the higher the molding pressure, the better the physical and mechanical properties. Furthermore, at high molding pressure, the properties reached a limiting point which they tend to be constant. The brake linings based on sawdust were then compared with commercial (asbestos-based) brake lining and the results are in close agreement. Hence, sawdust can be effectively used as filler for replacement of asbestos in brake linings.