FLAMMABILITY AND SOIL BURIAL OF SUGAR PALM FIBRE REINFORCED EPOXY COMPOSITES
MUHAMMAD HAZIQH BIN MOHD RIZALLUDIN
198755
DEPARTMENT OF MECHANICAL AND MANUFACTURING ENGINEERING
METHODOLOGY
ABSTRACT
Natural fibre composites are the most promising and widely used materials to substitute the plastic. Sugar palm trees, scientifically known as Arenga pinnata, grow in more humid climates and can be found in abundance in Malaysia. This project was performed to determine the effect of soil burial and flammability of sugar palm fibre (SPF) reinforced epoxy composites. The composites were fabricated with two different weight ratios between epoxy and SPF which are 70:30 and 50:50. The soil burial test was conducted for 16 weeks and the result showed that the Epoxy/SPF-50 was the composite that exhibited the fast degradability at 0.81%/week. The investigations of flammability properties were carried out by using horizontal burning test, limiting oxygen index (LOI) and cone calorimetry. The result from horizontal burning test showed that the addition of SPF reduced the burning rate but slightly increased at 50 wt% due the ratio between epoxy and SPF exceeds the optimum fibre loading. The Epoxy/SPF-50 recorded better LOI value at 23.3 compared to pure epoxy which is 19.8. The cone calorimetry test showed the data such as time to ignition (TTI), heat release rate (HRR) and total heat release (THR). From the test, the TTI values and THR values were decreased when the amount of SPF increased. The char production helps to increase the flame retardant protection of SPF reinforced epoxy composites.
The position of SPF from upper part to lower part of the tree trunk.
Epoxy/SPF-30 recorded the lowest burning rate at 15.4 mm/min. The flame took longer time to propagate along with the Epoxy/SPF-30 due to production of char. According to Suriani et al (2021), SPF frequently runs into char during burning process. The char providing further flame retardant protection.
The pure epoxy possessed low LOI value due to poor flammability properties of polymer matrix. According to Prabhakar et al. (2015), polymer matrices are weak against flame propagation and thermal load The Epoxy/SPF-50 recorded better LOI value which is 23.3 compared to the Epoxy/SPF-50 which is 22.5.
The SPF composites can be used to produce automotive components such as the parking lever brake, vehicle engine mounting, automotive bumper, antiroll bar and safety helmet.
The SPF composites also could potentially be used in construction and building industry.
CONCLUSION
APPLICATION
It was observed that the increasing amount of SPF increasing the degradability rate. The Epoxy/SPF-50 recorded the higher rate of degradability. The increasing of hygroscopic feature of composites enhanced the microbial activity resulting weight loss (Siew et al., 2019).
RESULT AND DISCUSSION