Experimental Investigation of Mechanical and Physical Properties on Epoxy Resin with Wood Timber for Furniture Application

ABSTRACT

Composites are attracting the attention of researchers nowadays because of their strength-to-stiffness ratio. The development of wood particle composites reinforced for practical purposes has been successfully attempted. This paper focuses on the application of an epoxy/hardener ratio with wood particle-reinforced polymers to develop high-strength wood composites. The percentage of wood particles in the composition varied as follows: 5, 15, and 25 wt%, with epoxy/hardener ratios of 5:0.3, 10:1, and 5:0.8. Appropriate surface modifications were made by different treatments with 0.6, 0.8, and 1 g of NaOH in 10 liters of distilled water and 0.2% KMnO4 for better adhesion of particles and epoxy. Flexural strength, impact strength, water absorption, and SEM were investigated. Nine experiments were investigated based on the Taguchi orthogonal array blend design. The composite was successfully fabricated using the conventional hand lay-up technique. The highest mean S/N ratio considered was found for wood content composition (15%), epoxy resin to hardener ratio (10%), and NaOH (1%), i.e. the main factors affecting the mean flexural and impact strength were the wood particle contents in the matrix. Water absorption was investigated. Water absorption was found to increase with wood particle content.

摘要

复合材料由于其强度与刚度的比值而受到研究人员的关注. 开发用于实际目的的增强木颗粒复合材料已经成功地进行了尝试. 本文重点研究了环氧树脂/固化剂与木颗粒增强聚合物的比例在开发高强度木材复合材料中的应用. 木材颗粒在组合物中的百分比变化如下: 5、15和25 wt%，环氧树脂/硬化剂的比例为5:0.3、10:1和5:0.8. 通过用0.6、0.8和1 g NaOH在10升蒸馏水中和0.2%KMnO4中的不同处理进行适当的表面改性，以更好地粘附颗粒和环氧树脂. 研究了弯曲强度、冲击强度、吸水率和扫描电镜. 基于田口正交阵列共混设计，对9个实验进行了研究. 采用传统的手工叠层技术成功地制备了复合材料. 木材成分（15%）、环氧树脂与硬化剂的比例（10%）和氢氧化钠（1%）的平均S/N比最高，即影响平均弯曲强度和冲击强度的主要因素是基质中的木颗粒含量. 研究了吸水性. 吸水率随木材颗粒含量的增加而增加.

KEYWORDS:

• ANOVA
• mechanical strength
• chemical treatment
• water absorption

关键词:

• ANOVA，机械强度，化学处理，吸水性

Acknowledgments

Thank you to all my colleagues and friends of the manufacturing engineering team, who supported me in all possible forms. In particular, special thanks go to my spouse, Tigist Tekletsadik Gesese and mechanical and automotive engineering department staff, We are very grateful. We sincerely acknowledge the courtesy of the authorities of Dilla University’s Research and Dissemination office by encouraging them to accept and work at their center. Finally, above all, we extend our special thanks to the almighty God for everything of merit is due to his benevolence.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Authors Contribution Statement

Belay Taye Wondmagegnehu: Investigation, Conceptualization, Methodology, Software, Validation, Visualization, Analysis, Resources, Data carnation, Writing – original, draft. Addisalem Adefris Legesse: Formal, Writing – review & editing, Supervision.

Additional information

Funding

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.