Natural fibers composition

I. SURVEY OF TECHNICAL APPLICATIONS OF NATURAL FIBER COMPOSITES... 

The lower thermal stability of natural fibers, up to 230°C, the thermal stability is only small, which limits the number of thermoplastics to be considered as matrix materials for natural fiber composites. Only those thermoplastics whose processing temperature does not exceed 230°C are usable for natural fiber reinforced composites. These are, most of all, polyolefines, such as polyethylene and polypropylene. Technical thermoplastics, such as poyamides, polyesters, and polycarbonates, require... 

Several of these natural fiber composites reach the mechanical properties of glass fiber composites, they are already being used in the automobile and furniture industries. Up to now, the most important natural fibers were jute, flax, and coir. 

Riedel, U., Nickel, J. (2003). Applications of natural fiber composites for constructive parts in aerospace, automobiles, and other areas. In A. Steinbiichel (Ed.). Biopolymers, vol. 10 (pp. 1-11). Wiley-VCH, New York. 

Natural Fiber Composites, Vol. IV, No. 9, Principia Partners, Cleveland, OH, 2005. 

Canadian Pat. No. 2,250,161 (August 28, 1997). O. Grill and D.L. Turk. Interfacial blending agent for natural fiber composites. 

A.R. Sanadi and D.F. Canfield. Interphase effects on the mechanical and physical behavior of natural fiber composites. In Second International Wood and Natural Fibre Composites Symposium, Kassel, Germany, June 28-29, 1999, pp. 9.1-9.18. 

W. Woods. Efficacy of a unique fungicide in wood filled plastic. In Conference Proceedings of Durability in Wood Plastic Natural Fiber Composites 2006, Intertech, Portland, ME, San Antonio, TX, December 4-5, 2006. 

V. Hristov, and J. Vlachoupoulos. Viscoelasticity and extrudate surface tearing of natural fiber composites. Rheol. Acta, in press. 

Until 2008, there was an explosive growth in wood and natural fiber composites in the United States. Because of the crisis in the building-products market, the demand for these composites dropped sharply. However, it is expected that economics, environmental concerns, and improved properties in the coming years will increase the demand for natural fiber composites. 

A. K. Bledzki, S. Reihmane, and J. Gassan, Properties and modification methods for vegetable fibers for natural fiber composites, J. Appl. Polym. Sci., 59 (1998) 1329-1336. 

Demand for natural fiber composites has been evident in Europe where environmental issues are prominent. As an example, all BMWs and Mercedes use natural fiber composites for components, such as door liners, boot liners and parcel shelves. 

Joshi, S.V., Drzal, L.T., Mohanty, A.K., Arora, S., 2004. Are natural fiber composites environmentally superior to glass fiber reinforced composites Composites Part A 35, 371-376. 

Hickey H., Natural fiber composites in automotive apphcations. Conference Proceedings Needle-punch 2002 International Conference (INDA) Mar. 19 21, (2002)., 14 pages. 

As an extension to the considerable amount of research undertaken on processing and properties of natural filler composites, in this last decade, a number of researchers have explored the concept of namral filler-reinforced PLA composites. An outstanding one is the project FAlR-CT-98-3919 (New ftmctional biopolymer-natural fiber composites from agriculture resources) by European Union, in which one of the key objectives was to manufacture demonstration parts on a pre-competitive level with the automotive industry as the main potential market. Within this project, Lanzillotta et al. [21] prepared biocomposites with flax fibers and PLA as the biopolymer matrix. The research focused on the idea of converting biocomposites into products for real automotive applications. 

Lanzillotta, C., Pipino, A., Lips, D. New functional biopolymer natural fiber composites from agriculture resources. In Proceeding of amraal technical conference of the society of plastics engineers, vol. 60, pp. 2185 (2002)... 

Shanks, R., Hodzic, A., Wong, S. Thermoplastic biopolyester natural fiber composites. J. Appl. Pofym. ScL 91(4), 2114-2121 (2004)... 

S. Kalia, B.S. Kaith, 1. Kaur, Cellulose Fibers Bio- and Nano-Polymer Composites Green Chemistry and Technology, Polyolefin Based Natural Fiber Composite (Springer, Heidelberg, Dordrecht, London, New York, 2011)... 

Kim, S.J. Moon, J.B. Kim, G.H. Ha, C.S. (2008). Mechanical Properties of Polypropylene/Natural Fiber Composites Comparison of Wood Fiber and Cotton Fiber. Polymer Testing, Vol.27, No. 7, (October 2008), pp. 801-806, ISSN 0142-9418 Kotek, J. Kelnar, L Studenovsky, M. Baldrian J. (2005). Chlorosulfonated polypropylene preparation and its application as a coupling agent in polypropylene-clay nanocomposites. Polymer, Vol. 46, No. 16, (June 2005), pp. 4876-4881, ISSN 0032-3861... 

Composites from natural fibres have not yet been fully established in high-tech industry because a sufficient quality for engineering applications is not adequately offered (e.g. by Natural Fiber Composites Inc. and North Wood Plastics). Fibres are available from many plants (highlighted of high quality) for example, wood, abaca, coir, cotton, flax, hemp, henequen, istle, jute, kenaf, ramie, sisal or sunn. 

Westman, M.P., Laddha, S.G., Fifield, L.S. et al. (2010) Natural Fiber Composites a Review. Nationtd Technical Information Service, US Department of Commerce, Springfield, VA. 

Adekunle, K., Aakesson, D. and Skrifvars, M. (2008) Synthetic modification of reactive soybean oils for use as biobased thermoset resins in stmctural natural fiber composites. Polymer Preprints (American Chemical Society, Division of Polymer Chemistry), 49(1), 279-280. 

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