Effect of alkali-silane chemical treatment on the tensile properties of raffia palm fibre

摘要

Natural fibres have several advantages such as poor surface adhesion to hydrophobic polymers lead to low strength.In order to improve the properties of Raffia palm fibres(RPF) that motivated this investigation.RPF were treated with NaOH and Silane solutions of various concentrations and time.The results obtained show that maximum tensile strength of the pretreated fibre(89.844N/mm~2) was achieved at a NaOH concentration of 0.25 M for 1 h.Silanationas a secondary treatment improved the tensile strength of the fibre to 136.329N/mm~2,well above that of the mercerised fibre(89.844N/mm~2) and untreated fibre(128./906 N/mm~2).High water absorbance of Raffia fibre was drastically reduced below 3% which is an improvement of 91% when compared to that of the raw fibre(34.83%).It has been established that Silanation treatment can be used for the improvement of the tensile strength and water absorption properties of Raffia palm fibres.