Utilization of High Density Polyethylene Wastes for the Production of Terrazzo Tiles
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Date
2018-10
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AAU
Abstract
These days, plastic wastes are the major environmental concerns that need rapid and continuous
solution. These wastes have to be either recycled or converted to less harmful products. Apart
from this, construction industry is growing with booming rate with high demand of construction
materials. This thesis work is aimed to utilize plastic wastes of high density polyethylene as
binding agent in the production of terrazzo tiles for out door applications. The significance of
this study is that it can be used as input for policy makers and for future researchers around the
topic. The production steps include: raw materials preparation, melting the plastic wastes, mixing
molten plastic and sieved river sand and molding using hydraulic pressing machine. The single
and the interaction effects of three process variables (percentage of plastic waste, sand particle
size and pressing pressure) on the flexural strength of the terrazzo tiles were analyzed and
discussed. The produced terrazzo tiles were analyzed for their physico-mechanical characteristics
such as flexural strength, water absorption and surface morphology. The maximum bending
strength of 20.7MPa was obtaianed at the optimum process variables (pressing pressure of
6MPa, plastic composition of 40% and sand particle size of 0.61mm). The maximum and the
average water absorption of the tiles were 0.28% and 0.11% respectively. The pruduced terrazzo
tiles have light weight but better physico-mechanical properties compared to conventional
terrazzo tiles. These are good indicatives that show the produced terrazzo tiles can fit for the
planned out door paving applications. Since the required properties are in the commonly
exprienced range, it can be concluded that high density polyethylene plastic wastes can be used
for the production of terrazzo tiles in the presence of the reinforcing river sand. Here, the plastic
waste was used for binding purpose and it can be potential substitution for cement in the
production of composite terrazzo tiles.
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Keywords
Plastic waste, terrazzo tiles, high density polyethylene, river sand, flexural strength, physicomechanical characteristics