Cigarette filters as additives for thermal-resistant composite fiberboard

Abstract

Cigarette filters have always seemed to have been a problem worldwide because of their improper disposal due to the large amount of hazardoussolid waste produced. Incorporating these cigarette filters into thefabrication of composite fiberboard could be a radical solution for wastemanagement. Furthermore, this study mainly intends to develop athermal-resistant composite fiberboard using cigarette filters. Thethermal conductivity of the fabricated fiberboard, the density, waterabsorption, compressive and tensile strength were observed to assess itsefficacy. The different design mixtures of cigarette filters and sawdust inthe production of composite fiberboard were utilized in this study. Basedon the density results, the mean density of the design mixture 90:10 wascalculated to be lower than the mean density of the control samples. Itindicates that the amount of cigarette filters affects the density of thecomposite fiberboard. The density and water absorption results weresignificant, implying that the design ratio 90:10 has low density. Theresults indicate that the control samples are more compacted and canabsorb less moisture because of the absence of cigarette filter fibers. Onthe other hand, the fiberboards' compressive and tensile strengthproperty varies depending on the number of cigarette filters in thedesign ratio. Moreover, all the composite fiberboards containingdifferent proportions of cigarette filters improve their resistance tothermal compared to the sawdust only as it reduced by 18% for 80:20,14% for 85:15, and 12% for 90:10. Therefore, the inclusion of cigarettefilters have a desirable thermal insulation capability. The different testsconducted on the fiberboards showed that the best result obtained wasthe design mixture 85:15 among all the others. This is because it meets the standard requirements for commercial use. Conclusively, cigarette filters have the potential as an additive for commercially available fiberboards.