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In developing countries, the methods used to recycle and re-use waste materials should be investigated in order to benefit from natural resources effectively. In our country, there are a lot of waste materials which have economic value. One of them is waste marble (Uygunoğlu et al., 2014). As a result of its geological location, Turkey possesses very rich, natural stone reserves in various colours and patterns (Çelik and Sabah, 2008). Marble wastes are generated by quarries and processing plants in different forms. The large amount of marble wastes is a serious problem for the industry and the environment (Tozsin et al., 2014).The by-product generated from marble processing is a powdered dust and may represent an environmental problem (Ghazy and Gad, 2014). Many researchers recently were interested in studying the possibility of recycle and re-use of such wastes in useful industries (Aliabdo et al., 2014). Natural stone powder is generally used as a raw material or reinforcement material in various areas such as building materials, bricks, ceramics, cement additives, desulphurization processes and infiltration. In addition, natural stone powder can be used in the production of polymer based composite material (Bilgin et al., 2012). The composite manufacturing has been a wide area of research and it is the preferred choice due to its superior properties like low density, stiffness, light weight and possesses better mechanical properties. This has found its wide applications in aerospace, automotive, marine and sporting industries (Gopinath et al., 2014). A composite material is a non uniform solid consisting of two or more different materials that are mechanically bonded together. Each of the various components retains its identity in the composite and maintains its characteristic structure and properties. Generally, the structure of a composite consists of two phases, matrix and reinforcement. Composite materials may be selected to give unusual combinations of stiffness, strength, weight, high-temperature performance, corrosion resistance, hardness, or conductivity (Askeland et al., 2010).

There is still a going research interest to find out alternative source of materials for composite manufacturing. Therefore, alternative non-wood based materials may play an important role in the forest product industry. Pine cone, a renewable resource, has not been used effectively. It is collected, dried to facilitate seed release, and generally discarded or burned in stoves in winter. Also, cone collection does not require extra costs. In this study, polymer matrix composites were manufactured using pine cone and marble wastes as filler and polyester as polymer matrix with casting method. Methyl ethyl ketone peroxide as hardener and cobalt naphthenate as accelerator were used to produce polyester matrix composites. Polyester: filler ratio was kept in constant and pine cone: marble waste ratios were changed. Mechanical properties of composite materials were investigated and the final product tested to determine their flexural strength, elastic modulus, hardness as well as some physical features such as density and water absorption. The experimental results showed that strength and hardness of the composite materials decreased with the increase in pine cone: marble waste ratio.