Influence of wood treatments on mechanical properties of wood-cement composites and of Populus Euroamericana wood fibers

ANALIA QUIROGA; VICTORIO MARZOCCHI; IGNACIO RINTOUL

COMPOSITES PART B-ENGINEERING

ELSEVIER SCI LTD

Lugar: Amsterdam; Año: 2016 vol. 84 p. 25 - 32

1359-8368

<!--@page { margin: 2cm }P { margin-bottom: 0.21cm }-->Wood-cement composites are interestingmaterials for structural and isolation purposes. Dimensionalstability, economic factors and resistance to environmentaldegradation are features that can be exploited for housingcomponents. The main inconvenient affecting its manufacture is theincompatibility between wood and cement, caused by settinginhibitory substances present in woods. Wood treatments aremultivariable processes required for the appropriate cement settingreaction on wood surfaces. Treatment conditions affect themechanical properties of the resulting composites. This workevaluates the simultaneous influence of the variables ruling threewidely used wood treatments -water extraction, degradation byalkaline hydrolysis and retention of inhibitory substances- on themechanical properties of wood fibers and of resulting wood-cementcomposites. Populus Euroamericana wood fibers and Portland cementwere selected as case materials. The alkaline hydrolysis was found asthe most effective treatment for the suppression of inhibitorysubstances and the highest decrease on mechanical properties ofresulting composites. Empirical relationships describing thedependence of the compressive modulus of elasticity and compressionstrength of wood-cement composites with the wood treatment variablesare presented.