THE OPTIMIZATION OF COSTS FOR THE THERMOFORMED FRAMES FROM NATURAL FIBER COMPOSITES

Recent years have seen an increasing focus on the environment which has led to replacing traditional materials with newly developed composites. These composites are environmentally friendly and are made using raw materials from renewable resources. This is the case for composites made of plant fibres and different polymer matrices which are more and more common in the furniture industry. Companies are looking for ways of reducing manufacturing costs due to the market competition. The current paper aims to develop a method of optimizing the cost of products by considering the factor of safety and the stiffness. These dimensions depend in turn on the composite's ultimate tensile strength and Young's modulus. The study was conducted as part of a research program led by Taparo S.A., an upholstered furniture manufacturer.