Natural fibers such as hemp, kenaf and bamboo are renewable, abundant, inexpensive, and readily available.  There are great potentials and numerous benefits for replacement of glass fibers with natural fibers in making fiber-reinforced unsaturated polyester composites.  However, natural fiber-reinforced unsaturated polyester composites typically have lower strengths and high water uptake than glass fiber-reinforced unsaturated composites.  Several new coupling agents have been developed from modifications of renewable vegetable oils and investigated for surface modifications of natural fibers.  The surface modifications greatly increased the mechanical strengths and greatly reduced the water uptake of the resulting fiber-reinforced unsaturated polyester composites.  Methods for the surface modifications will be presented.  The mechanism for improving the strength and water resistance will be discussed.

Surface modifications of natural fibers for improving the strength and water resistance of natural fiber reinforced unsaturated polyester composites

243rd National Meeting (2012)

The official archive and repository for all ACS Meetings & Expositions abstracts and select posters or presentations.