Studies on the properties of rice-husk-filled-PP composites: effect of maleated PP

• Main Authors: Simone Maria Leal Rosa, Evelise Fonseca Santos, Carlos Arthur Ferreira, Sônia Marlí Bohrz Nachtigall
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Associação Brasileira de Metalurgia e Materiais (ABM); Associação Brasileira de Cerâmica (ABC); Associação Brasileira de Polímeros (ABPol) 2009-09-01
• Series: Materials Research
• Subjects: polymer-matrix composites; density; coupling agent; wettability
• Online Access: http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1516-14392009000300014

Rice husk is a by-product of rice milling process that usually finds inadequate final disposal (burning, land filling). Thermoplastics composites filled with rice husk flour are materials that offer an alternative for using this agricultural resource viewing the production of low dense materials with some specific properties. In this work composites of polypropylene (PP) and rice husk flour (RHF) were prepared by melt extrusion. Maleic anhydride-modified PP (MAPP) was added as a coupling agent. It was verified that tensile strength decreased with filler loading. The presence of MAPP improved this property showing a strong dependence on the MAPP/RHF ratio (MAPP/RHF = 0.03 produced the best results). The density of the composites slightly increased with filler and coupling agent in comparison to pure PP. The presence of MAPP diminished more than 20% water uptake in highly-loaded composites.