Study of Flexural, Tensile, Impact properties and Morphology of Potato Starch/Polypropylene blends.

The effect of potato starch contents on mechanical and morphological properties of polypropylene starch blends have been investigated in this work. The maleic anhydride grafted PP (PP-g-MA) was used as coupling agent to improve the adhesion between starch and polymer matrix in melt blending as interfacial strength between reinforcement and polymeric matrix has direct effect on the properties of blend. For this purpose the content of starch varied from 15 to 30% and coupling agent (i.e. PP-g-MA) was taken 10%. The blends were compounded on co-rotated twin screw extruder. Then, mechanical properties such as tensile, flexural and impact were evaluated. It was found that the tensile and impact strength remained almost constant, while flexural strength of the blend improved by 45%, and percentage strain decreased with increasing starch content in the blend. The scanning electron micrograph (SEM) supports the finding as its shows uniform distribution of starch particle in the matrix. The chemical structure was analyzed by FTIR. The Melt flow Index (MFI) of blends also supported the uniform distribution of starch within the polymeric matrix.