Renewable, biodegradable materials are essential materials to be developed. Natural fiber and biodegradable polymer become the most promising materials applied fabrication of environmentally friendly or green composites (GC). This paper deals with the fabrication and tensile properties characterization of ramie reinforced poly-lactic acid (PLA) resin-based green composites. The short random fiber orientation GC fabricated from ramie fiber and granular PLA resin. The tensile strength of composite materials varies with changing variations in the citric acid solution concentration to treat and added to the ramie fiber, which used as a reinforcement in the process of making the GC materials. The highest value of tensile strength achieved from this study was 58.06 MPa, which is for composites with ramie fiber reinforcement that treated with a 4% concentration of a citric acid solution. It suspected that GC with 4% of citric acid fiber treatment has the highest fiber-matrix interfacial adhesion. These results supported by FTIR spectra and fracture surface SEM analysis. Hence, it could be concluded that 4% of citric acid concentration solution fiber treatment was the effective one to improve interfacial adhesion and tensile properties of green composite with low environmental impact.
Volume 12 | 02-Special Issue
Pages: 809-814
DOI: 10.5373/JARDCS/V12SP2/SP20201136