recycled PE woodfibre product

Plastic lumber products can be worked with conventional carpentry tools and have a number of advantages over wood plastic composite fence gate products. They resist rot, mildew and termites; they do not require regular painting or staining; and they are, otherwise, low maintenance materials. Many plastic lumber products are highly attractive and can be manufactured to meet a wide variety of design and appearance specifications. When wood or some other natural fibre source is incorporated into the material, many plastic lumber products can be painted or stained. 2
A recent trend in the production of woodfibre-plastic composites is the use of virgin polymers in place of recycled plastics. Polypropylene (PP) and polystyrene (PS) offer both a higher flex modulus (a measure of board stiffness) and a higher flexural strength (resistance to breaking) than polyethylene. The use of virgin polymers may also offer a wider variety of aesthetic options, including pigmenting choices and reproducible patterns. However, the higher cost of virgin polymer plastic lumber products may limit their market share.

The all-recycled-content attractive wpc flower boxes board stock, such as that produced by the Trex Company Inc. (with plants in Winchester, Virginia, and Fernley, Nevada), will continue to have a major raw material cost advantage compared to either pure polymer extrusions or composites made with virgin polymers. In the future, the plastic lumber market may segment as consumers weigh the properties of virgin polymer gainst the lower cost of recycled PE woodfibre products.

With growing markets for its products, the plastic lumber industry is actively researching new products, applications and production processes. This has lead to the development of a number of new products offering improved properties. A good example is a oodfibrepolypropylene composite that is oriented following extrusion and cooling. It results in an open porous structure that looks a lot like wood, and offers a flex modulus that is close to wood and a flexural strength about double that of wood.

A key issue facing the plastic lumber industry in the early 1990s was the lack of engineering standards for the products it produced. This gap is being addressed by the Plastic Lumber Trade Association, which has worked to establish a set of ASTM standards that apply to plastic lumber made (primarily) from high density polyethylene (HDPE). The polyethylene building composite flower boxes  industry is also working on ASTM standards that would address the properties of composites. The evelopment of appropriate standards that address the properties of plastic lumber will support future growth in non-structural  applications, such as deck boards, siding etc. However, building codes in Canada and the U.S. have not been revised to allow for the use of plastic lumber in any coded applications. Some suppliers are currently working to address this problem.