Sheng Zhang, Wufei Tang, Limin Li, Jun Sun*, Xiaoyu Gu*, Shou Chen, Xiaohua Peng, Serge Bourbigot. Fabrication of fly ash-based mesoporous aluminosilicate oxides loaded with zinc and its synergistic fire resistancy in polypropylene. Journal of Vinyl and Additive Technology. 2019. DOI: 10.1002/ vnl.21726

https://doi.org/10.1002/vnl.21726

Abstract

A kind of mesoporous aluminosilicate oxides (MAOs) were fabricated from industrial waste, coal fly ash. After loaded with zinc on MAO, the product MAO‐Zn was characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X‐ray diffraction, thermogravimetric ****ysis, and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). MAO‐Zn was incorporated with intumescent flame retardant (IFR) together and used in polypropylene (PP). Basic characterization including limiting oxygen index (LOI), vertical burning test (UL‐94), and cone calorimeter test (CCT) were finished. The result showed the LOI value of PP was only 17.7 and cannot pass UL‐94 grade; however, 25 wt% IFR in PP help the composite obtained LOI value of 27.6 and passed UL‐94V‐1 grade. Surprisingly, with only 2 wt% MAO‐Zn substitution of IFR, the LOI of PP/IFR composite sharply went up to 37.2 and passed V‐0 grade. CCT results documented that heat, **oke, and fatal gas release were obviously suppressed by IFR/MAO‐Zn combination. By SEM observation and quantitative ****ysis of TGA results, the contribution of MAO‐Zn was summarized as adsorption of heat/**oke and promotion on charring. It was worth mentioning that the low dose of MAO‐Zn (≤ 3 wt%) did not bring further deterioration on mechanical properties. J. VINYL ADDIT. TECHNOL., 2019. © 2019 Society of Plastics Engineers