ACTA SCIENTIFIC AGRICULTURE (ISSN: 2581-365X) Volume 3 Issue 9 September 2019 The Effects of Sodium Hydroxide (NaOH) Surface Treatment on Dried Banana Leaves Fibre (DBLF) to Prepare and Characterize Degradable Plastic Materials with waste Polypropylene Thinakaran Narayanan 1,2 *, Jeefferie Abd Razak 1 , Intan Sharhida Othman 1 1 Fakulti Kejuruteraan Pembuatan, Universiti Teknikal Malaysia, Melaka, Hang Tuah Jaya, Malaysia 2 Department of Mechanical Polymer, National Youth and High Skill Institute (IKTBN) Sepang, Bandar Baru Salak Tinggi, Malaysia *Corresponding Author: Thinakaran Narayanan, Department of Mechanical Polymer, National Youth and High Skill Institute (IKTBN) Sepang, Bandar Baru Salak Tinggi, Malaysia. Research Article Received: August 08, 2019; Published: August 22, 2019 A wide-ranging application of thermoplastic materials has stricken most current industries, such as manufacturing industry, transportation industry, medical industry and many more other industries [1]. Due to plastic flexibility characteristic, the utiliza- tion of petroleum-based non-biodegradable plastic is turn out to be endless. This scenario has cultivated the important of post- production on waste plastic, combined with natural fibres, which are currently available and feasibly being consumed as a second- ary phase of the polymer matrix composites (PMC). The resulting composite also known as green composites. The bio composition between waste plastic and natural fibres have superior and out- standing mechanical properties as well as physical properties [2]. Thermoplastic materials have been increasingly used for various applications [1]. In this research, the waste from injection mould- ing scrapped was consumed as a matrix and the plant-based natu- ral fibres have been utilized to reinforce the matrix phase. Introduction Abstract Disposal of the after-used plastic-based product has created worldwide problems on environmental pollution. This scenario has initiated the inventiveness to develop eco-friendly biocomposites products. In this research, recycled waste polypropylene (rPP) was loaded with dried banana leaves fibre (DBLF), for rPP/DBLF composites fabrication. The effects of sodium hydroxide (NaOH) treat- ment on DBLF has studied based on the resulted mechanical and fracture morphological properties of produced rPP/DBLF compos- ites. Dried banana leaves have been ground into 30µm of fibre length, and rPP was taken from injection moulding scrap and crushed into finer rPP particles. The rPP/DBLF composites are prepared through double steps compounding method by using a melting device (230°C, 95 rpm, 60 mins) followed by an injection moulding process (210°C, 30 seconds of residence time) for various amount of treated and untreated DBLF fibre loading at 0, 10, 20, 30 and 40 wt. %. It was found that the tensile strength (TS) of treated NaOH- rPP/DBLF composite has significantly increased into about +45.20% with 30wt.% of DBLF-NaOH loadings, in comparison to the un- filled rPP sample. Loading of NaOH treated DBLF into rPP was enhanced the strength result which indicates successful reinforcement effects introduced by DBLF-NaOH filler. This could be explained by finer DBLF particle morphology as observed by SEM and presence of OH group from the successful NaOH treatment, which responsibly encouraged the mechanical interlocking and chemical bridging with rPP, for improved matrix-filler interaction, that significantly increased the TS. In overall, this study has successfully highlighted the potential of DBLF filler to enhance the properties of rPP, as an additional choice of degradable plastic-based composite for various promising applications. Keywords: rPP; DBLF; Degradable Plastics; Tensile; Fracture Surfaces; NaOH Surface Treatment Natural fibres which were extracted from plant-based are very attainable and abundant resources to substitute for high cost and non-renewable synthetic fibres [1]. Natural fibres acquired low cost, low density, non-toxicity, possessed comparable strength and almost no waste disposal issues [2]. As we know, among the Southeast Asia nations, Malaysia having varieties of plant-based fibres including coconut coir fibres, kenaf fibres, palm oil empty fruit bunch, banana fibres, pineapple fibres, etc. At this time, the consumption of plant-based natural fibre is very popular and com- mon in numerous engineering applications, such as in telecommu- nication, electrical and electronic industry [3]. The incorporation of natural fibres and waste recycled polypropylene (rPP) have ex- tremely improved the mechanical strength of produced composites [4]. In this study, dried banana leaves fibre (DBLF) has been utilized as a secondary phase for rPP matrix which was produced from an injection moulding process. So such a reason, the waste polypro- pylene was taken from an injection moulding operation and was DOI: 10.31080/ASAG.2019.03.0628 Citation: Thinakaran Narayanan., et al. “The Effects of Sodium Hydroxide (NaOH) Surface Treatment on Dried Banana Leaves Fibre (DBLF) to Prepare and Characterize Degradable Plastic Materials with waste Polypropylene". Acta Scientific Agriculture 3.9 (2019): 165-168.