Modelling of the blend ratio effect on the mechanical properties of the biofibres

Abstract

This work investigates the effect of the blend ratios of three different environmental-friendly biopolymers on fibres’ properties made by water bath extrusion machine and multi-stage drawing frame. Tensile test, shrinkage test, differential scanning calorimetry and scanning electron microscopy are used to study the mechanical and thermal properties of composed fibres. In the modelling stage, stepwise regressions were used as faster and less prone technique to over fit the results by watching the order in which blend ratios are increased or decreased, that help to meet the requirements of specific applications. The statistical-based models control the biodegradable fibre properties beyond the selected range of the blend ratios more than that can be obtained from single polymer equivalents. The forecasting designed program simulates the relationship between the blend ratios and the biofibre’ properties to save both time and cost of the production process, this novel method steps could be applied on different polymers.

Keywords:

• Modelling
• melt spinning
• hot drawing
• stepwise regressions
• biodegradable fibres

Acknowledgements

The author is indebted to the Textiles department/ Faculty of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering /Damascus University, Syria for the testing equipments and the research support. The author is indebted to Dr Alex Fotheringham and technicians in the extrusion lab/the School of Textiles and Design/Heriot-Watt University, UK for their greatly valued support.