Improving Flame Retardancy of Pineapple Leaf Fibers

Abstract

Pineapple leaf fibers (PALF) are very suitable to act as reinforcing composite matrixes. Nevertheless, PALF is highly susceptible to the risk of fire hazard. Therefore, priority is often being placed in order to improve the fire retardancy of the PALF and its composite products. This chapter discusses the behavior of natural fibers in fire and various fire properties testing methods that can evaluate the fire performance of natural fibers. Different conventional fire retardant additives and its effects to the PALF fibers and its resultant composites are also been reviewed. Aluminum trihydroxide is the most popular flame retardant in the world. However, due to the prohibition of halogenated retardants, phosphorus-based flame retardants are expected to witness a gratifying market gains in the next few years. Flame retardants that are commonly used in improving flame retardancy of a material could be divided into reactive retardants, active fillers, and inert fillers. It also can be categorized based on their chemical nature, namely phosphorus-, halogen-, silicon-, and mineral-based flame retardants as well as nanometric particles. Different types of flame retardants have different mode of action and, therefore, is also functioned differently, where the mode of action of a flame retardant can be conveniently classified into physical action and chemical action.