AbstractsBiology & Animal Science

Nowadays, when environmental concerns are becoming increasingly important are there great interest in natural materials and recyclability. The possibility of reusing materials with maintained mechanical properties are essential for sustainability. Today produced approximately 90,000 tons of natural fiber reinforced composites in Europe of those are 40,000 tons compression molded of which the automotive industry uses 95%. Natural fiber reinforced composites is recyclable and therefore interesting in many applications. Also, natural fiber reinforced composites is inexpensive, light in weight and shows decent mechanical properties which makes them attractive to manufactures. However, the problem with natural fiber reinforced composites is the poor adhesion between fiber and matrix, the sensitivity of humidity and their low thermal stability. Those problems could be overcome by addition of compatibilizer and reactive filler. This study will examine the technical requirement in order to develop a sustainable and recyclable biocomposite. It investigates the composition of matrix (polypropylene), fiber (flax), compatibilizer (maleic anhydride grafted polypropylene) and reactive filler (CaO) in order to obtain various combinations of stiffness, strength and processability. The two main methods used for preparing samples were compounding and injection molding. Results shows that 20 wt% flax was the optimal fiber content and that maleic anhydride grafted polypropylene is a very good compatibilizer by enhancing the strength significant. Surprisingly was the strength impaired due to the addition of CaO. The composition of 20 wt% flax, 1 wt% maleic anhydride grafted polypropylene and 79 wt% polypropylene is the technically most favorable composition.