Combustion and Mechanical Properties of Fire Retardant Treated Waste Paper-Waste Acrylic Raw Fiber Composite Board

Shredded waste newspapers, waste acrylic raw fibers, and urea-formaldehyde (UF) adhesives, at 10% by weight on raw material, were used to produce recycled waste paper-waste acrylic raw fiber composite boards in laboratory scale experiments. The physical and mechanical properties of fire retardant treated recycled waste paper-waste acrylic raw fiber composite boards were examined to investigate the possibility of using the composites as internal finishing materials with specific gravities of 0.8 and 1.0, containing 5, 10, 20, and 30(wt.%) of waste acrylic raw fiber and 10, 15, 20, and 25(wt.%) of fire retardant (inorganic chemical, FR-7^®) using the fabricating method used by commercial fiberboard manufacturers. The bending modulus of rupture increased as board density increased, decreased as waste acrylic raw fiber content increased, and also decreased as the fire retardant content increased. Mechanical properties were a little inferior to medium density fiberboard (MDF) or hardboard (HB), but significantly superior to gypsum board (GB) and insulation board (IB). The incombustibility of the fire retardant treated composite board increased on increasing the fire retardant content. The study shows that there is a possibility that composites made of recycled waste paper and waste acrylic raw fiber can be use as fire retardant internal finishing materials.