Investigation of the Structure of Liquid Glass Thermal Insulation Material Using a Granular Filler

Abstract

Thermal insulation materials are among the most effective building materials, which can significantly reduce the consumption of materials and the cost of constructions. The purpose of thermal insulation is to limit the amount of heat transferred. Any fencing offers some resistance to heat transfer. However, to achieve significant thermal resistance, it is necessary either to make fencing of a large thickness, which is not economically feasible, or to use heat-insulating materials that can significantly reduce the thickness of the fencing.

Recently, the tendency of replacing organic construction foams with inorganic ones - based on liquid glass - has become increasingly common in the world. Heat insulating materials based on liquid glass have low density and thermal conductivity, high porosity, the effective temperature range of their operation is from -20 °C to +600 °C, they are non-combustible, resistant to acids and their vapors, do not emit toxic substances, are not affected fungi and microorganisms, have an unlimited lifetime, which gives these materials advantages over combustible and toxic organic polymers, which, moreover, have a very limited lifetime.

The foam properties are determined by its structural parameters, which, in turn, depend on the composition of the composition and the technology of the foaming process.

In this paper there has been investigated the structure of block thermal insulation materials made on the basis liquid glass binding and granular filler, also made on the basis of liquid glass obtained by cold foaming using various blowing agents. There has been studied the effect of blowing agents and different ratio of granular filler to the binder to cross pore diameter, coefficient of shape and degree of heterogeneity structure of the blocks.

When investigating the structure of insulation materials, it was found that the best gas-forming agent is aluminum powder. The samples obtained with its use are characterized by high porosity, which positively affects the thermal insulation characteristics of the material, and rather high strength indicators, which allows the material to be transported without significant damage. The introduction of granular filler into the composition contributes to the formation of a more even and durable structure of the heat-insulating material. Pores of this material are mostly closed, evenly distributed throughout the volume.