Fabrication and Characterization of Acrylic Acid Treated Rattan Fiber Reinforced Polyethylene Terephthalate Composites for Packaging Industries

Abstract

In the present work, treated and untreated novel RA reinforced PET thermoplastic polymer composites were developed. The fibers were chemically modified before fabrication of the composites to have a better fiber-matrix bonding. Thermo-mechanical properties of the composites were studied. An enhancement in mechanical properties were found at the beginning phase with the increase in treated rattan fiber content till optimum fiber loading (i.e 20 wt%) thereafter the properties decline. At 20 wt% fiber loading the mechanical properties obtained were 67.89 MPa of tensile strength, 83.29 MPa of flexural strength, 3.98 GPa of young’s modulus, and 24.18 kJ/m2 of impact strength. Different properties of the composites were thoroughly studied and the composites fabricated at 20 wt% of fiber content reveals excellent mechanical and thermal properties and found very much suitable for packaging applications.

Keywords

• rattan fibers
• chemical treatment
• mechanical properties
• thermal properties
• polyethylene-terephthalate
• sem