Study on preparation of polymer composites based on polypropylene reinforced by jute fibers

Abstract

The use of graft copolymer of maleic anhydride polypropylene (MAPP) as a coupling agent in jute-polypropylene composites improved the mechanical properties of the composites. The scanning electron microscope (SEM) observations for fractured surfaces of unmodified and modified jute-polypropylene composites confirmed that the increase in performance was due to an increase of fiber-matrix adhesion. Jute and glass fibers were hybridized by ply-by-ply and skin-core structures, here glass and jute fibers were used as the skin and core layers, respectively. The test results show that the hybrid composites have superior mechanical properties. Especially, the impact strength increases significantly from 13.2 kJ/m2 to 38.9 kJ/m2, which is 190% higher than that of a jute fiber reinforced composite.