Philippine E-Journals

Potential of Reinforced Rice Hull and Coconut Coir Composite Utilizing Waste Low Density Polyethylene for the Furniture Industry

Cecilia P. General

Discipline: Economics, Industrial Science

 

Abstract:

Plastic composites reinforced with coconut coir and rice hull were developed and evaluated in this study. The coconut coir was gathered from Cagayan while the rice hulls from Isabela. The coconut coir and rice hulls were blended with recycled low-density polyethylene collected from garbage. Investigations on the properties of the composite products showed that the most promising blend is 10% coir, 10% rice hull and 80% recycled low-density polyethylene. The impact strength of the product was higher or within the range of the injected molded pure recycled low-density polyethylene. The deficiency of the composite was the low tensile strength, which suggests that they should not be utilized in systems requiring high tensile property. The composite products had the tendency to absorb water, which shows that its application is limited to indoor furniture.

This study achieved its goal of discovering the potential of coconut coir and rice hull reinforced with low-density polyethylene as an alternative raw material for the manufacture of furniture. Coconut coir and rice hull are feasible sources of wood fiber and could be utilized to reduce the cost of traditional furniture manufacturing and be of help in reducing plastic waste.