An Environmentally Friendly Composite Composed of Short-Cut Grass and Starch

Short-cut grass and starch were selected as raw materials to prepare environmentally friendly composite by hot-pressing method. Results indicated that short-cut grass and starch were easily mixed uniformly by water medium and adapt to hot-pressing process. Hot-pressing time and hot-pressing temperature influenced the performances of composites. The strength and elongation first increase and then decrease with the increase of two processing factors. Tensile strength and strength at fracture reach 2.3 MPa and 1.2 MPa respectively when hot-pressing was performed at 140 °C for 10 min. The tensile strength is always higher than strength at tensile fracture and the elongation at fracture is always higher than that at maximum force. This indicates that the fracture of composite is ductile fracture. The hardness of composite is uneven. Long hot-pressing time resulted in not too obvious decrease of hardness.