Mechanical and physical properties of HDPE/PKS composites: Effects of filler content and size of PKS fillers

摘要

The mechanical and physical properties of palm kernel shell (PKS) reinforced with high-density polyethylene (HDPE) have been investigated by using there different filler loading of 5wt.%, 10wt.% and 15wt.%. The PKS filler was prepared for two different particle sizes namely fine size (150 μm-212 μm) and coarse size (300 μm-422 μm). The HDPE/PKS composites were compounding by using twin screw extruder and turn them into pallet form. Then, pallet form of HDPE/PKS composites sample was prepared with an injection moulded machine produced dogbone shape of samples. Tensile test and flexural test has been used as the mechanical testing for this study. Based on the results of tensile strength, the fine size PKS provided better result than the coarse size PKS for the 10wt.% PKS loading. Optimum PKS loading was the sample with 10wt.% PKS loading comes with fine size PKS as the finer the size of PKS give better tensile strength.