| Summary: | In this project, oil palm fibers/mats(OPF) are used for the development of composite boards. Initially, the fibers are pretreated with an aqueous alkaline solution and non-halogenated flame retardants before impregnating with organic/inorganic binders to improve the fire performance. The surface modification of the fiber is accomplished through mercerization and timbor(disodium octaborate tetrahydrate) treatment. Fly ash was also explored as an additive in the boards. This work focuses on investigating the mechanical, water susceptibility and sound absorption properties of two variants of OPF boards with differing compositions. It was shown that with high loading of fly ash, the flexural properties of the boards are unaffected even after immersing the boards in warm water(~60oC) containing excess lime for 56 days. This test was carried out according to ASTM C1185.
Moreover, the impact strength of these boards(with higher content of fly ash) are prominent and can absorb 39% more energy compared to those boards with less loading of fly ash. Crack propagation studies were also carried out to understand the failure mechanisms. Despite the differences in mechanical properties, acoustic properties(sound absorption) of both the board variants have shown good sound absorption with absorption coefficient values of up to 0.82 at lower frequencies. Finally, the results are compared with the other commercially available refractory-based boards, such as gypsum and magnesia.
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