An experimental methodology to determine the parameters of the compression molding process of composite materials made of recycled thermoplastic and recovered wood

ABSTRACT The objective of this research is to determine the sintering process parameters of wood-plastic composite materials (WPC) manufactured by compression molding and with better properties from an engineering point of view. The structure of this article is, by itself, a proposal of experimental methodology to obtain WPC from recycled thermoplastic particles and recovered wood. This methodology includes the characterization of both starting materials and compression-molding tests, to determine in a first stage the temperature and time of sintering and, in a second stage, the content and size of the wood particles. Using recovered capirona wood (RCW) and recycled polypropylene (RPP); these parameters are evaluated by standardized tests on molded samples. For this case, the parameters are: 50 min of time into the oven at 190 °C, 30% and 70% in volume of RCW and RPP respectively and RCW particles from 0,98 mm to 1,90 mm of size.