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Abstract
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The main purpose of the study is to characterize a tire rubber powder (TRP) and a tire rubber granule (TRG) as a matrix for a composite reinforced with wasted wool fibers (WWF) and wasted glass fibers (WGF). The rubber FTIR spectroscopy indicated the presence of natural rubber (NR), butadiene rubber (BR), and styrene-butadiene-styrene (SBR). Besides, the DSC curve shows an exothermic event at 325ºC that corresponds to the polymer chain breaks in the vulcanization process followed by the depolymerization of the compound. The TGA analysis reported that around 0.6% weight loss occurs between 50°C and 100°C indicating desorption of absorbed water. Nevertheless, the 0.57% weight loss was recorded at 350ºC and this is due to CO2 desorption representing the decomposition of carboxyl, lactone, and lactol groups. Therefore, 18.3% weight loss was recorded between 350ºC and 800ºC signifying CO desorption corresponding to the decomposition of carbonyl, ether, quinine, and phenol groups on the carbon surface at higher temperatures. The XRD analysis of the rubber confirms a high crystallinity rate equal to 97%. The main component found is carbon in addition to rubber production additives such as SiO2 CaCO3 and ZnO. Compared with wasted wool fibers, it may be concluded that wasted glass fibers improved efficiently the composite breaking strength. The most rigid reinforced composite structures are obtained using a process with a consolidation time of 75min. Reinforced composite specimens (rubber/WWF and rubber/WGF) consolidated at 60 min and 75 min show good mechanical properties allowing them to be industrialized for different uses.
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