Preparation And Study On The Properties Of Kenaf Fibre Reinforced Pe And Pp Composite Materials

Kenaf possesses such features as high content fibre, high toughness, low specific gravity, a good machinability, and low cost. In order to take full advantage of abundant kenaf resources in China and Development of practical environmental materials, hence it's most significant to carry out the investigation of kenaf fibre reinforced PE and PP composite materials.In this paper, kenaf fiber was modified by means of alkali solution and KH-550 silane coupling agent. The TG tests of kenaf fibre both without modified and modified with KH-550 silane coupling agent were conducted on computer differential thermal balance, a suitable temperature range was selected 40℃～137℃according to their respective mass loss temperature range. In addition, the structure of fibre was characterized by IR spectrum.The various proportions of kenaf fibre and PP (PE) mixtures were blended in RM-200 rheometer.The influence of various processing conditions on the performance of machinability was investigated on base of rheological curve analysis, meanwhile, a part of blends was chosed to carry out thermolysis tests and IR analysis.The tensile strength, flexural strength and impact strength of KF/PE (KF/PP) composite materials were measured with computer control with electronic universal testing machine (MT5105) and the screen impact testing machine (JB-500). The results showed as follows:The mechanical properties of PE could be improved greatly with kenaf fibre blends, the maximum mechanical properties were reached at 10% content of kenaf fibre. The tensile strength, flexural strength and impact strength were elevated 4.7%,106.3%, and 37.5% as compared with PE, respectively. The kenaf fibre was modified with KH-550 silane coupling agent in 95% epoxy ethane alcohol solution, the mechanical properties of modified kenaf fibre/PP blends get better than that of PP. the flexural strength of modified kenaf fibre/PP composite was elevated 6.9% as compared with PP under conditions of 10% content 1.5 mm-length modified kenaf fibre. The mechanical tests of KF/PP composite with fibre length of 1.5 mm,2 mm,4 mm,6 mm revealed that the best mechanical properties was attained at 2 mm and beteer than that of specimens consisted of crushed blends.