Comparison of mechanical characteristics of oil palm fruit bunch fibre (EFB)-polypropylene (PP) composite with other composite compositions / Rosmanizam Mohd Dali

Malaysia is the largest producer of palm oil in the world. The utilisation of oil palm fruit bunch in making palm oil contributing to so many oil palm empty fruit bunch and other residues of oil palm tree such as trunks and fronds. Therefore, many researchers and scientists not only in Malaysia tend to do research on how to manage of those residues or left over material including empty fruit bunch. They also want to develop or produce a value added products such as furniture, building and construction materials and many other consumer goods. Recent studies on EFB came out with a new material composed of EFB-polypropylene (PP) composite which is claimed has a high strength, lower cost, versatile, recyclable, and environmental friendly. Our study is still on EFB-PP composite however, we only wanted to analyse and compared its mechanical properties between two different compositions of sample. One of them consist no added additive while the other consist of added additive that is carbon. The specimens were sheet form supplied by PolyComposite Sdn. Bhd. Malaysia. The sheet was in average of 2 mm and 3mm thick.