Study of ageing effect on mechanical properties of prosopis juliflora fibre reinforced palm seed powder filled polymer composite

ABSTRACT

In this work, the natural fibres are reinforced into synthetic fibres along with natural fillers. The fibres are extracted from prosopis juliflora plant barks. The juliflora plants consumes ground water, making the land unusable for cultivation purposes. Then the filler material is obtained by powdering the palm kernel seeds. The palm seeds are collected from the palm trees and by drying it become harder and it was made into powder. The powder is then sieved and separated by their sizes. Both the prosopis juliflora (PS) fibres and the palm seed powder are embedded into the epoxy matrix through compression moulding process and the composite was subjected to ageing, as per the standards and conducted mechanical testing under equal intervals. As reinforcement and the fillers are bio degradable materials, ageing analysis determines the characteristics of the composite in the due course of time. The results showed, mechanical properties can be obtained by adding 30 wt% of PS fibres treated with silane and the addition of the palm kernel seed powders afftect the hardness of the composites to some extent. As the hardness and the water resistance are better, this composite can be used in Automobile and light roofing applications.

KEYWORDS:

• Palm seeds
• prosopis juliflora fibre
• optimisation
• chemical treatment
• ageing analysis

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.