The Effect of Wood Sawdust Mesh Combination on Mechanical Behaviour of Particle Board

Particle boards are widely used as furniture materials in the world. The particle boards on the market have a disadvantage that is when this materials contact with water, the mechanical properties decrease significantly. Material engineering is carried out by changing the particle board composition and other factors. One of the factors that influence the quality of particle board is wood sawdust mesh. Filler mesh combinations are carried out to obtain the best quality particle board. The result of experiment refers to SNI 03-2105-2006 for some mechanical properties, such as density, thickness swelling, hardness, bending strength, and impact toughness. The compositions of particle board in this research are 15% fibre of oil palm, 50% wood sawdust, 15% resin epoxy and 20% polyvinyl acetate (PVAc). Samples were carried out by cold press single punch method with pressure 30 bar. The result from this research known that the best mechanical properties of particle board on filler mesh combination M40-60-80, those are: density 0.95 g/cm³, thickness swelling 1.93%, hardness 29.30 N/mm², bending strength 16.38 MPa, and impact toughness 3.38 kJ/m². This value has exceeded the particle board on the market. (paper)