Expanded polystyrene (EPS) polymers are widely used in isolation and packaging applications. If their waste hasn’t been managed well and due to their long degradation time, they will cause severe environmental problems for human beings, plants, and animals. Therefore, recycling could be one of the acceptable solutions to overcome such problems in addition to reinforcing them to recover the lost properties resulting from recycling. In this work two types of EPS have been recycled at different temperatures and reinforced by E-glass fibers in mat form and as random short fibers leading to composite samples with different properties. The samples have been prepared by homemade thermal press and several parameters (i.e., processing temperature, fiber content, and fiber length) have been studied with regard to tensile properties such as strength, modulus, and ductility. Furthermore, interfacial adhesion has been investigated by estimating the strength and modulus efficiency factors. The results show that the fiber could improve the strength with more than 300% enhancement and fiber length affects significantly the mechanical properties based on the fiber critical length.

Title

An-Najah University Journal for Research - A (Natural Sciences)

Publisher

An-Najah National University

Publisher Country

Palestine

Publication Type

Both (Printed and Online)

Volume

38

Year

2042

Pages

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