The effect of the presence of skin on the mechanical properties of milkweed wood flour-plastic composite

The large parts of the southern regions of Iran are covered by wild milkweed plants. The latex and roots of these plants are used in the pharmaceutical industries, but the wooden parts of this plant are left as waste. Since lots of this type of wastes are annually produced; hence, we conduted this study to use lignocellulosic wastes of wild milkweed plants for the manufacturing of wood-plastic composite and then the mechanical properties of the fabricated compositewere studied. To make composite, milkweed flour in three mixing levels of 30, 40 and 50 percent of total composition, maleic anhydride grafted polypropylene as a coupling agent in two mixing levels of 4 and 6% percent of polymer, were used as variable factors. Also, some of the wood was not debarked, and the level of 40%, was made using debarked wood flour.The mechanical properties of fabricated composite including bending strength, bending modulus, tensile strength, tensile modulus and impact strength, were measured.The study results showed that by increasing milkweed flour consumption, the tensile strength of composite was decreased, but the bending strength was improved. In each of the different mixing levels of milkweed flour (30, 40 and 50 percent), the flexural modulus and tensile modulus of composites increased by increasing the amount of coupling agent (from 4 to 6%).On the other hand, the impact resistance of composites decreased by increasing the amount of lignocellulosic flour in each of the coupling agent mixing levels. Also, the presence of the skin did not adversely affect the mechanical properties of the composite, and it is possible to use this type of wood without the need of debarking.