Areca fibers have a great prospect in the polymer composite field since they possess superior properties like being light weight, strong and having high strength-to-weight ratio. In addition, areca fibers are biodegradable, non-toxic and eco-friendly and have low maintenance cost. In this research work, areca fibers were subjected to chemical treatments such as NaOH, KMnO4, C6H5COCl and H2C=CHCOOH to reduce the hydrophilic nature of areca fibers and to improve interfacial adhesion between areca fibers and thermoplastic polypropylene matrix, so that areca-polypropylene composites with improved properties can be obtained. The untreated and all chemically treated areca-polypropylene composites with 30%, 40%, 50%, 60% and 70% fiber loadings were fabricated by the compression molding technique. Investigations of tensile, flexural and impact properties of areca fiber reinforced polypropylene composites were done under given fiber loadings by following American Standard for Testing Materials (ASTM) standard procedures. Amongst all untreated and chemically treated areca-polypropylene composites, acrylated areca-polypropylene composites with 60% fiber loading showed higher tensile and flexural strength values and with 50% fiber loading showed higher impact strength values. Hence, chemically treated areca-polypropylene composites can be considered as a very promising material for the fabrication of lightweight material industries.

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Natural areca fibers were treated with sodium hydroxide, potassium permanganate, benzoyl chloride and acrylic acid to improve interfacial adhesion between the areca fiber and epoxy resin and to fabricate areca fiber reinforced epoxy composites with improved mechanical properties. The untreated and chemically treated areca fiber reinforced epoxy composites were prepared with 40%, 50%, 60% and 70% fiber loadings. The investigation of flexural strength was done for all areca/epoxy composites. Untreated and chemically treated areca/epoxy composites with 60% fiber loading showed higher flexural strength values. The acrylic acid treated areca fiber reinforced epoxy composites with 60% fiber loading showed highest flexural strength values amongst all untreated and chemically treated areca/epoxy composites with same 60% fiber loading.

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