Mechanical properties of bamboo fiber bundle-reinforced bamboo powder composite materials

Abstract

This paper reports the mechanical properties of bamboo fiber bundle-reinforced bamboo powder composite materials. Bamboo fiber bundle-reinforced bamboo powder composite materials were made from bamboo powder as matrix and bamboo fiber bundles as reinforcement arranged in random directions. The tensile and flexural strengths of the fabricated products were investigated. First, the effect of the water content of bamboo powder and molding temperature on the strength characteristics was studied. The results showed that the bamboo powder product prepared with a water content of 7.2% and molded at a temperature of 200 °C exhibited the highest adhesive strength between short fibers and bamboo powder. The tensile and flexural strengths of the bamboo fiber bundle-reinforced bamboo powder composite materials increased at temperatures ranging from 160 to 180 °C but decreased at 200 °C. The strengths of the composite materials fabricated at 200 °C were reduced because of the decrease in the strength of the fiber bundle itself. Therefore, 180 °C was concluded to be the most suitable molding temperature in terms of fiber bundle reinforcement. The bamboo fiber-reinforced bamboo powder composites molded at 180 °C and with a fiber bundle content of 70% exhibited the highest tensile and flexural strengths, at 45.0 and 101.4 MPa, respectively, with a density of 1.42 g/cm³. These results are equivalent to those of engineering plastics such as PVC and POM, indicating that the prepared composite materials are suitable substitutes for plastics in terms of density, tensile and flexural strength.