Effects of chemical treatments on physical properties of flax fibres

The hydrophobicity of flax fibres often leads to the poor fibre/hydrophobic matrix adhesion. The flax fibres are amenable to modification so as to solve the problem. Alkali, acetylation, silane treatment and enzymatic treatment were employed for the flax fibre mats in author’s study. To understand how these treatments affect the physical properties, infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA) were conducted on flax fibres. It was found that all the treatments result in the removal of pectin component within the primary cell wall due to the disappearance of the characteristic peak at 1735 cm-1. Comparing with the untreated fibres, the onset degradation temperature of treated ones decreased, however, the peak of the maximum decomposition rate shifted to high temperatures, indicating a better thermal stability