Physico-mechanical, thermal, and coating properties of composite materials prepared with epoxy resin/steel slag

The interest in using different solid waste as reinforcement in polymer composite preparation has increased considerably in recent years. Slag is one of the inorganic waste materials obtained from ore processing. In this work, epoxy composites filled with different percentages of slag were prepared. Physico-mechanical, thermal, and coating properties of these composites were determined depending on the amount of filler, type of hardener, and polyethylene glycol (PEG) addition. X-ray diffraction (XRD) studies were carried out to examine the compatibility of the filler and epoxy resin and XRD results showed good compatibility between two materials. The results of mechanical testing illustrated that hardness of the epoxy composites containing anhydride was partially higher than with Epamine PC17 in contrast to elongation at break. The tensile strength and Young modulus decreased with increasing filler amount. When compared to neat epoxy resin, corrosion, and adhesion properties of the composites with filler addition did not change significantly. The highest water sorption values were obtained for the epoxy composites with PEG addition. The composites hardened by anhydride had better thermal stability than the composites including Epamine PC17. POLYM. COMPOS., 38:1974-1981, 2017. (c) 2015 Society of Plastics Engineers